Sitting of 6 December 2004

Preamble
The House met at half-past two of the clock: The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Salisbury.

BMA Report: Biotechnology, Weapons and Humanity II
Lord Archer of Sandwell Lord Archer of Sandwell asked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they have responded to the report of the British Medical Association, Biotechnology, Weapons and Humanity II
The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean): My Lords, the Chief Medical Adviser, Sir Liam Donaldson, will respond on behalf of Her Majesty's Government to the British Medical Association's report, Biotechnology, Weapons and Humanity II. Officials from the BMA and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office will meet in the new year to discuss some of the ideas and recommendations contained in the report.
Lord Archer of Sandwell: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that promising response and readily recognise the work of the Government to establish an international regime. Is it proposed to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the biological weapons convention coming into force? Can we not use that opportunity, together with our European partners and respected organisations like the BMA and the Red Cross, to try to persuade the American Government that peaceful nations have nothing to lose and everything to gain from an effective regime?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, I would very much like to celebrate in the way that my noble and learned friend Lord Archer suggests. Of course we must not lose sight of the fact that the Americans are signatories to the convention. They are not signatories to the protocols as to verification. As my noble and learned friend is well aware, that has been at the heart of the problem. The BMA report provides some admirable highlights about potential dangers from the advancement of science and technology increasing the likelihood of the development of bio weapons. We want to talk to the BMA further about that.
We also look forward to taking further forward the very constructive role we have played when we chair the meeting in December next year on this important issue.
Lord Walton of Detchant: My Lords, the meetings to which the noble Baroness refers as being held in the new year are very welcome. Would it not be important to try
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to involve the United States in meetings of a similar nature, even perhaps in the form of a conference, since although it has signed up to the convention, it is apparently not willing at the moment to sign up to many of the important issues which have been highlighted in the BMA report?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, although the United States has found difficulty with the protocol, it has made it clear that it has a commitment to the convention and to strengthening it through the current inter-sessional progress. I am sure that your Lordships will recall that when we discussed the matter about a year ago I said that a number of conversations about how the protocol and the convention could be taken forward were in progress. That remains the case. The United States is not disengaged from this process; it perhaps is not as supportive of the protocol as we would wish it to be.
Baroness Neuberger: My Lords, there is a lot of evidence to suggest that some of the technology which is being used to create new vaccines and find cures for Alzheimer's could also be used for malign purposes. Are the Government considering ensuring that some of that research does not take place? When the Chief Medical Officer responds to the BMA's report, will the Minister and the Government look at whether there can be domestic legislation to criminalise bio weapons research?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, as I have said, we shall be discussing the matter further with the BMA at a meeting scheduled for the new year. However, in 2005 when we take over the chairmanship of the grouping, we wish to discuss the content, the promulgation, the adoption and the enforcement of codes of conduct for scientists in this important area. The noble Baroness will know that this matter has been discussed. It is a particular element that we, the British Government, wish to focus upon when we take over the chairmanship.
Earl Howe: My Lords, the question of the noble Baroness raises an interesting set of issues about the responsibility placed upon research scientists to guard against dangerous applications of their work. Do the Government believe that this is an important issue? If so, will they take this to the BMA as one of the topics for discussion to ensure that the risks to which I have referred are managed and policed properly?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: Yes, my Lords, I agree very strongly with the noble Earl. That is why in preparation for the meetings of the states' parties in 2005, to which I have already referred, the United Kingdom has held a series of seminars. They have been designed to promote discussions between industry, the NGOs and academia on the codes of conduct that I mentioned to the noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger.

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They will be the subject of international discussion next year. The BMA has been well represented at these seminars and its views and ideas have greatly helped to shape our approach to our chairmanship next year. So this is an inclusive process. The BMA is very much a participant in that process.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick: My Lords, will the Minister tell the House whether the Government will give their full support to the recommendation of the Secretary-General's panel, which is that the issue of verification should be taken up again and moved forward?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, we have wanted the issue of verification to be taken up for some time. I have directly raised it with my own interlocutors in the United States Government in the years since the United States originally decided that it was not prepared to sign up to the protocol. The whole question is how this is done. That is why we have promoted the discussions in a more informal way between the meetings of the high-level representatives. We shall continue to do what we can to ensure that there is a verification process. I think that in other contexts we all recognise the importance of such verification processes.

Mobile Phone Masts
2.44 p.m.
Baroness Hanham Baroness Hanham asked Her Majesty's Government:
What is their response to the ruling of the Court of Appeal on 13 November, in relation to the siting of mobile phone masts, that it remains the responsibility of central government to decide what measures are necessary to protect public health.
Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, it is for Her Majesty's Government to decide what measures are necessary to protect public health. The planning policies for telecommunications developments are based on the advice received from the Stewart group. However, the science has not allayed public concern, so it is considered important that local communities are engaged in the planning process for such developments. The Minister for Housing and Planning, Mr Keith Hill, will be making a Statement about that later this week, which we will also repeat in the Hansard of your Lordships' House.
Baroness Hanham: My Lords, are the Government aware of the great concern felt by parents about the siting of mobile phone masts at or adjacent to schools? Although I hear what the Minister says about the Statement, what action will the Government take to enable planning authorities to take account of health concerns, which they are not allowed to do at present as a result of the Stewart
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report? Will they be commissioning any further research to see whether the masts have any electromagnetic effects on the population?
Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, of course the Government are aware of public concern about health matters. We all take those issues very seriously indeed. I do not want to pre-empt Mr Hill's Statement this afternoon. Obviously, like any parent, I am concerned about the siting of masts. That is why there are clear guidelines and provisions in the planning process, so that local planning authorities can take careful account of locally expressed views.
The noble Baroness asked about further studies. As I said, the Government accept that there is concern about health matters in relation to mobile phone technology. For that reason, we have established the mobile telephone health research programme, costing about £7.36 million annually, which is jointly funded by government and industry. We are keeping the whole question of mobile phone technology under careful review and will continue to keep the public informed of any new research findings.
Lord Taverne: My Lords, in order to dispel the widespread myths about the risks from phone masts, will the Government consider making available to editors of newspapers and television producers the evidence of actual incidence of cancer among children living near those masts and a control group far removed from them? Does the Minister not agree that, whatever the evidence about the effect on and risk to health of mobile phones, the risk from masts is infinitely less, because the intensity of radiation is hugely diluted?
Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, there is much detailed research matter in the public domain. We try to make publicly available what research findings there are and it is open to editors to make proactive use of them. The noble Lord is right to say that the risks are very low.
Baroness Carnegy of Lour: My Lords, will the Government ask the police and/or Network Rail to share their mast sites with other providers? That would mean that there could be fewer sites and the danger, whatever it was, could be lessened.
Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness for her question. She makes a very good point and we will pass on her suggestion.
Baroness Scott of Needham Market: My Lords, the fact that planning applications for mobile phone masts are increasingly not just the subject of planning appeals but are going to the High Court suggests that the guidance is not as clear as the Minister suggests and currently meets neither the aspirations of local ommunities nor the strategic objectives of telecommunications companies.

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Does the noble Lord not agree that the time has come to revise the guidance to make it much clearer and easier to interpret?
Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, there will of course be some revision of the guidance, because the planning policy guidance process is turning into a different form of planning guidance. There have been recent reviews of PPG8 and I understand that it is widely understood. The problem is that local residents sometimes do not like what they hear; one has to be realistic about that. The noble Baroness makes a point about the number of appeals. It is certainly true that there was a large increase in appeals and in the quantity of written representations on planning applications. Thankfully, that appears to have peaked and may well now be tailing off, but it is of course open to local political activists to stir up such issues. It is in their interests to do so; one can well understand that.
The Countess of Mar: My Lords, is not much of the concern about the tetramasts, which I understand are used by the police and other services? Is there not some indication that low level sound waves affect brain cells and that the people—the parents—who are expressing their concerns about children are probably quite right to do so?
Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, I am not inclined to agree with the first point of the noble Countess, but I can certainly understand parents being concerned about health issues. It is understandable that where a newly emerging technology is developing as fast as this one is, parents express those important concerns volubly and powerfully in their local communities.
Baroness Hanham: My Lords, will the Minister confirm that it is not possible for a planning committee—I declare my interest as a member of one—to take health considerations into account in considering those applications?
Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, basically, the noble Baroness is right: the local planning authority must deal with the facts of the planning issues in front of it, but the planning process is of course often used to express other views.

Drug Tests: Drivers
2.50 p.m.
Lord Luke: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Dixon-Smith is unable to be present today to ask his Question. On his behalf, and at his request, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in his name on the Order Paper:
How many individuals have been prosecuted and convicted following roadside drug tests since the introduction of such tests.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Scotland of Asthal): My Lords, Section 4 of the Road Traffic Act 1988 makes it an offence to drive or attempt to
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drive while unfit through drink or drugs. Historically, statistics have not differentiated according to the cause of impairment. New sub-classifications, introduced on 1 January 2004, will make such a differentiation possible, so identifying the number of offences involving drugs. The 2004 figures are expected to be available in autumn 2005.
Lord Luke: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that Answer, but is not the only way to catch motorists driving while under the influence of drugs or alcohol effective road-traffic policing? Does she agree with me that the 11 per cent fall in the number of road traffic police officers since 1996 and their apparent replacement by speed cameras means that perpetrators are less likely to be apprehended?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, unfortunately, I cannot agree with the noble Lord. Of course we have taken advantage of new technology to make accurate detection easier. That has been possible using the technology, which has appeared to enhance our ability to bring offenders to justice.
Lord Berkeley: My Lords, the breathalyser is the accepted means of checking whether people are over the limit for drink offences. What is the equivalent for drugs, and which types of drugs can it detect? Is it as accurate as the breathalyser has now become?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, there is a clear difference between the test for drink and the drug test. Noble Lords will know that in drink testing one must be over a prescribed limit. It is a different offence from that with which we are currently dealing. The test for drugs can identify only whether the drug is present in the body. It does not identify the level at which the drug is to be found. That can be done only by more specific analysis. The nature of the individual's driving must then be observed to understand whether the drug has made that person unfit to drive.
Lord Dholakia: My Lords, is there adequate provision to monitor roadside drug testing to ensure that it does not adversely affect one particular racial group, as is the case with stop-and-search legislation?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, roadside testing will be done in a proper manner. I understand the point made by the noble Lord. However, there will usually be some indication of impaired driving, which would cause the person to be stopped, at which stage there would be an examination. I take on board the sensitivity that the noble Lord has expressed. I assure him that we will be assiduous in ensuring that there is parity of treatment of all who are so stopped.
Lord Tebbit: My Lords, does not the Minister agree that her answer to her noble friend suggests that, in detecting and prosecuting those driving under the influence of drugs, we are back where we were in relation to alcohol offences before the introduction of

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the breathalyser, and that that means that very few people will be convicted of driving while unfit through drugs?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, I do not accept that that is our position. The noble Lord should know that we are developing more sophisticated testing. The Railways and Transport Safety Act 2003 introduced to the Road Traffic Act 1988 improved powers to test at the roadside for both drink and drugs. Those powers allow the police to require motorists to undertake at the roadside preliminary impairment tests and preliminary drug tests. The preliminary impairment tests require a trained officer to observe a suspect in the performance of specified tests and to make such other observations about that person's physical state. Legislation requires a code of practice which will specify exactly how tests must be undertaken. The combination of those two and the fact that we are developing very sophisticated tests that can be used at the roadside means that we are a long way from where we were and far down the road of proper intervention.
Earl Attlee: My Lords, can the Minister explain why the road traffic fatality rate has remained more or less static over the past five years?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, we cannot say why the rate has remained static; perhaps we should rejoice that it has not gone up. Noble Lords will know that, until fairly recently, the numbers were going up and up. I hope that we will be able to celebrate the fact that we can contain them and, it is to be hoped, drive them downwards.
The Countess of Mar: My Lords, is any distinction made between people who have taken illicit drugs and those who have taken prescription drugs, where they have been warned that they may be drowsy and therefore should not drive cars or operate machinery?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, there is no distinction between illicit drugs and those obtained lawfully. The real test is the effect on driving. If the consumption of drugs so impairs an individual's driving as to make it unsafe, it is a trespass against the law.
Lord Brougham and Vaux: My Lords, the Minister said that there were measures other than police on the motorways to detect drivers under the influence of drugs or alcohol. If there are no police on the motorways, what measures are there?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, there are still police officers on the motorways. Noble Lords will know that traffic is monitored, sometimes very closely, through cameras. It is possible through that monitoring to send necessary police officers to a particular spot. On a number of occasions offenders are stopped by police officers after they have been observed on camera and requisite police officers have
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been moved into place to intervene. Those measures have greatly helped our ability to detain road offenders. I respectfully suggest to the noble Lord that they should not be seen as a disadvantage; they are an acute advantage.

Middle East: UK Foreign Policy
2.57 p.m.
Lord Dykes Lord Dykes asked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they propose to make any changes to their foreign policy with regard to the Middle East.
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, the policy that lies at the heart of the Government's approach to the Middle East is a two-state solution; that is, Israel living in peace and security with its neighbours, and the establishment of a state of Palestine which is viable and contiguous. That policy will remain unchanged under this Government.
Lord Dykes: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for that Answer. Does she agree that the British Government have a major role to play? I wish her and other Ministers well in the resumed road map negotiations. Does she further agree that a key to that, with our special relationship, is that the Government should arrange frequent meetings with US officials to ensure absolutely that President Bush sticks to his long-expressed pledge and solemn promise to ensure a viable, fully fledged Palestinian state alongside a secure Israel?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, I believe that we have an important role to play. I do not want to be accused of overplaying my own hand or that of the Government in that respect, but I think that it is an important role. Not only bilaterally, but through our partnership in Europe and our membership of the quartet, it is a role in which we will not be found wanting. My right honourable friend the Prime Minister, when he was in Washington on 11 and 12 November, discussed those matters with the President of the United States, as did my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary when he was in Israel/Palestine on 24 and 25 November. I assure the noble Lord that officials of the United States of America are in no doubt where the British Government stand.
Lord Clinton-Davis: My Lords, while supporting the concept of a two-state solution, how can the Government, through the European Commission and the EU, influence extremist opinion on both sides of this delicate topic?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend on his birthday today. I agree with him that it is enormously important to try to influence extremist opinion on both sides. In eight years of dealing with such matters, I have always found that it is important to try not to take a particular side in public statements. The moment that one is put

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into the position of taking a particular side, no matter where sympathies may temporarily be engaged, one starts to lose the confidence of those on the other side of the argument.
Having said that, I must say that it is none the less clear where the Government stand on the two-state solution, and it is clear what our policies are on enormous questions such as, for example, suicide bombings, on the one hand, and targeted killings, on the other. One must be clear that certain actions taken by both sides are never acceptable. None the less, those actions should not impede one from having an understanding of the position of both sides.
Lord Howell of Guildford: My Lords, can the Minister tell us whether the newspaper reports that Britain is planning a major Middle East conference in January or February are correct? Have the Government thought of putting forward a proposal to appoint a mediator—a substantial international figure—to begin to drive the process forward, in the new era of opportunity following Arafat's death, on the lines of the role played by Senator George Mitchell in Northern Ireland?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, we are considering an international meeting. I hesitate to use the words "international conference", because doing so might cause confusion with the conferences that are mentioned in phase 2 and phase 3 of the road map. They are conferences to bring the two sides together on the question of negotiations.
What is under consideration is a meeting that aims to support the Palestinians in their moves towards developing the institutions to prepare for statehood. That matter is still under discussion. No decisions were taken on whether there would be such a conference.
The noble Lord referred to a mediator. There is some discussion about that in relation to the United States. There is no specific question of a mediator in relation to the UK, although I am sure that my right honourable friends the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary would not wish to rule out anything at this stage.
Lord Roberts of Conwy: My Lords, what is the Minister's opinion of the view attributed to President Musharraf that the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel is the key to the diminution of terror not only in the Middle East but elsewhere?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, it is certainly the key to unlock a great number of the world's problems not only in the Middle East but throughout the globe, as they spread under the influence of what is happening in the Middle East. I hesitate to follow a direct thought process from there to the question of terror, but there is no doubt that what is perceived by many as injustice in the Middle East is used to justify terror. That is clear.
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I turn rather to the point made by my right honourable friend the Prime Minister in another place:
"I do not think that there is a more pressing political challenge facing the world today".—[Official Report, Commons, 17/11/04; col. 1346.]
I think that many of us would be prepared to agree with that.
Lord Dykes: My Lords, the Minister referred to the possible international meeting in the new year to take the process further. Can she confirm that the Palestinian president who will by then have been elected will automatically be invited, regardless of the provenance of the successful candidate?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, I think that the noble Lord, Lord Dykes, is referring to the fact that one of the people who has declared himself available is in prison, at present. There might well be some difficulty with inviting such a person to an international meeting or, at least, with their ability to accept such an invitation, were they to be elected.
We will have to see what the outcome of the Palestinian elections on 9 January is. We hope that whoever is elected will be a president of the Palestinian people who is committed to peace, and that, if there is a meeting on the subjects to which I referred in my answer to the noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford, whoever is elected will be in a position to come to that meeting.
Lord Campbell-Savours: My Lords, would it not be more difficult for Al'Qaeda to recruit if the problem of Palestine were sorted out?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, that is a huge question. At a personal level, I am inclined to say, "Yes". At a personal level, I believe that it is true that terrorist organisations are able to use leverage on the issue in relation to the Middle East.
The Earl of Listowel: My Lords, has the Minister discussed with her colleague in the Department for International Development what contribution a greater emphasis on the education of girls and young women in the Middle East might make to long-term stability?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, that question goes way beyond the question of Israel/Palestine. The Middle East goes way beyond the question of Israel/Palestine. I took it that that was the point that the noble Lord, Lord Dykes, was raising in his initial Question, although it might have been broader than that.
The education of girls and young women throughout the Middle East is at the heart of the discussions that we are having through the Euro-Med organisation. I participated in those discussions last week in The Hague. It is also part of what is under discussion through the G8 initiative on Arab reform.

Administration and Works
  Works of Art
    Hybrid Instruments
      Personal Bills

        Standing Orders (Private Bills)
        3.6 p.m.
        The Chairman of Committees (Lord Brabazon of Tara): My Lords, I beg to move the five Motions standing in my name on the Order Paper.
        Administration and Works
        Moved, That a Select Committee be appointed to consider administrative services, accommodation and works, including works relating to security, within financial limits approved by the House Committee;
        That, as proposed by the Committee of Selection, the following Lords together with the Chairman of Committees be named of the committee;

        Bp. Chelmsford,

        L. Cope of Berkeley,

        B. Darcy de Knayth,

        L. Dixon,

        L. Grocott,

        L. Kirkham,

        B. McFarlane of Llandaff,

        E. Mar and Kellie,

        L. Roper,

        L. Shaw of Northstead,

        B. Wilkins,

        L. Williamson of Horton;

        That the committee have leave to report from time to time.
        Works of Art
        Moved, That a Select Committee be appointed to administer the House of Lords Works of Art Collection Fund; and to consider matters relating to works of art and the artistic heritage in the House of Lords, within financial limits approved by the House Committee;
        That, as proposed by the Committee of Selection, the following Lords be named of the committee;

        L. Bernstein of Craigweil,

        V. Chandos,

        L. Cobbold,

        L. Crathorne (Chairman),

        L. Eames,

        L. Luke,

        E. Onslow,

        L. Redesdale,

        L. Rees,

        L. Rees-Mogg,

        L. Tordoff,

        B. Warwick of Undercliffe;

        That the committee have leave to report from time to time.
        Hybrid Instruments
        Moved, That a Select Committee be appointed to consider hybrid instruments and that, as proposed by the Committee of Selection, the following Lords together with the Chairman of Committees be named of the committee:

        L. Campbell of Alloway,

        V. Craigavon,

        B. Fookes,

        L. Grantchester,

        L. Harrison,

        L. Luke,

        L. Sandberg.

        Personal Bills
        Moved, That a Select Committee be appointed to consider personal Bills and that, as proposed by the Committee of Selection, the following Lords together with the Chairman of Committees be named of the committee:

        V. Allenby of Megiddo,

        L. Geddes,

        V. Simon,

        L. Slynn of Hadley,

        L. Templeman,

        B. Thomas of Walliswood.

        Standing Orders (Private Bills)
        Moved, That a Select Committee on the Standing Orders relating to private Bills be appointed and that, as proposed by the Committee of Selection, the following Lords together with the Chairman of Committees be named of the committee:

        L. Geddes,

        B. Gould of Potternewton,

        L. Greaves,

        L. Luke,

        L. Naseby,

        L. Palmer,

        V. Simon.—(The Chairman of Committees.)

        On Question, Motion agreed to.

        Agriculture (Northern Ireland) Order 2004
        Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton: My Lords, I beg to move the first Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.
        Moved, That the draft order be referred to a Grand Committee.—(Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton.)
        On Question, Motion agreed to.

        Financial Provisions (Northern Ireland) Order 2004
        Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton: My Lords, I beg to move the second Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.

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        Moved, That the draft order be referred to a Grand Committee.—(Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton.)
        On Question, Motion agreed to.

        Disability Discrimination Bill [H.L.]
        3.7 p.m.
        The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Baroness Hollis of Heigham): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time.
        I took great pride in our manifesto commitment to deliver comprehensive civil rights for disabled people. The Bill will complete that task. I know that many of your Lordships were present when we debated the original Disability Discrimination Act. In particular, I refer to my noble friend Lord Carter, who has led the campaign so valiantly, and to my noble friend Lord Ashley of Stoke. I pass on the apologies of my noble friend Lord Morris, who cannot be present today, but I am confident that he will join us in Committee. I am especially grateful to the joint parliamentary scrutiny committee chaired by my noble friend Lord Carter for its positive and thorough contribution.
        Disabled people face greater difficulties than most. They encounter institutional ignorance and misunderstanding, individual prejudice and the all-too-familiar barriers to access in every walk of life. That can have a devastating effect on their opportunities and self-esteem.
        The Government have taken a wide range of practical action to improve disabled people's lives, from launching the New Deal for Disabled People to ensuring that trains, buses and coaches are accessible. Underpinning all of that—I am sure that the whole House will share our position—is our commitment to comprehensive civil rights. Such rights are fundamental if society is to remove the barriers to the participation of disabled people and empower disabled people.
        The Disability Discrimination Act that we inherited had many merits. We have subsequently discovered that it also had some shortcomings. Our task has been to address those shortcomings, while building on the Act's strength.
        I shall remind your Lordships of some of the milestones. The Disability Rights Commission Act 1999 established an effective enforcement body for disabled people. I think that it was my noble friend Lord Carter who said that it was like putting the engine into the DDA system. In October 1999, we introduced rights of access so that service providers had to make reasonable adjustments to their policies, practices and procedures or provide auxiliary aids and services. Through the Special Educational Needs and Disability Act 2001, we amended the DDA to protect disabled pupils and students.
        We brought the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (Amendment) Regulations 2003 into force on 1 October this year—many of your Lordships here today took part in those discussions—which, along with many other
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        improvements, ensure that there is comprehensive coverage of occupations and that all small employers are subject to the Act's employment duties. As your Lordships will recall, as regards DDA provisions, we have brought the number of employees down from 15 effectively to one or to nil.
        Also on 1 October, we brought into force the final rights of access in the DDA, which means that service providers have to, where reasonable, remove physical barriers to enable disabled people to access their services. Throughout that period we introduced a range of regulations under the Act's transport provisions. These ensure, for example, that; ill new rail vehicles must be accessible and that by 2017 all buses will need to be accessible.
        We hope that this Bill is the final part of the transformation of rights for disabled people. We are already leading Europe in our approach to civil rights for disabled people, and this Bill will help consolidate our position there.
        Most of the changes that we propose were recommended by the Disability Rights Task Force, which my right honourable friend Andrew Smith set up in 1997. Representatives of disability organisations, trade unions, employers, local authorities and the education sector, including many individuals with disabilities or with family members with disabilities, made major recommendations. We accepted the vast majority of these and they form the basis of our reforms.
        The Bill has been widely welcomed by the chairman of the Disability Rights Commission, Bert Massie—I am sure that I speak for the whole House when I pay tribute to his work—the Employers' Forum on Disability—again, I would like to pay tribute to the work of Susan Scott-Parker—the CBI. the TUC, the National Housing Federation and MIND, among many.
        It is a very good Bill, which puts rights for disabled people at least on a par with the most comprehensive of other equality legislation, bearing in mind that rights for disabled people are not the same as race relations issues. It contains powerful provisions to improve disabled people's chances to be fully involved in society.
        However, I know that there are some who would wish us go further still. But it is critical that the Bill does not undermine employers' and service providers' efforts to deliver on existing DDA duties, many of which came into force only in October—barely two months ago. That would not be good for disabled people. So we will not be altering the fundamental and familiar DDA concepts which are increasingly understood and working. But we have accepted all the recommendations from pre-legislative scrutiny that we felt able to do.
        Perhaps noble Lords may allow me briefly to run through the purport of the Bill. Clause 1, concerning councillors, would insert new Sections 15A to C into the DDA. Local authorities in Great Britain, including the Greater London Authority, would be placed under a duty not to discriminate against their members when they carry out their official business as councillors by treating them less favourably or by failing to make a reasonable adjustment.

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        For example, if a disabled member of a planning committee could not attend a Tuesday morning meeting because she has a regular hospital appointment for her condition, the council would need to consider whether changing the meeting was reasonable. Many of the proposals would cost virtually nil, but would insist on putting the needs of disabled people in the foreground so that they are not treated less favourably in their capacity as office holder.
        Local authorities already have duties under the DDA as employers, service providers and landlords. So we do not think that the new duties will be difficult or unfamiliar to implement. There are very few instances when there is a problem, but, when they occasionally emerge, it is right to be clear.
        Clause 2 deals with discrimination by public authorities and would extend the DDA to prohibit discrimination against disabled people by public authorities as they exercise their functions. Many activities of public authorities are already covered by the DDA. This clause would ensure that disability discrimination law extends across almost all their remaining activities, bringing into coverage functions such as the issuing of licences, a planning authority drawing up a local plan or the appointment of governors by a school. It should be noted that governors are under Clause 2 here, not Clause 1. For example, a government department conducting a consultation on new laws would need to ensure that disabled people were able to find out about the proposals and give their views.
        New Section 21B would prohibit discrimination by public authorities. The definition of public authority used in the Bill is the same as in the Race Relations Act and the Human Rights Act, with certain limited exceptions that are necessary for constitutional or national security reasons.
        New Section 21C would exempt a limited list of functions from the scope of the Bill. These exemptions, which mirror those in the Race Relations Act, protect the integrity of the judicial process and the sovereignty of Parliament. New Sections 21D and E define discrimination in an analogous way to the definition in Sections 19 to 21 of the DDA. Bodies would face similar duties for both their functions and their services, providing clarity for the bodies and for disabled people.
        Clause 3 would create a new proactive duty on public bodies requiring them to consider how to eliminate discrimination against, and harassment of, disabled people, and to promote greater equality of opportunity. That will promote a major change to the culture of public bodies. So, for example, public authorities will need to look carefully at the outcomes that they are achieving for disabled people. For example, they may wish to review their employment processes in order to eliminate the barriers that prevent disabled employees achieving their full potential. The clause creates that duty by inserting a new Part 5A into the DDA.
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        Under the Scotland Act, the promotion of equality of opportunity is a devolved matter and the Government will follow the Sewel convention and ask the Scottish Parliament for approval to that provision. New Section 49A sets out the general duty on public authorities to have "due regard" to the need to eliminate unlawful discrimination and harassment and to promote equality of opportunity for disabled people, which would be supported by regulations and specific duties. We published our proposals for these earlier this year in the consultation document, Delivering equality for disabled people.
        Clause 4, concerning the police, is a technicality to ensure that the police are fully covered by disability discrimination law. Clause 5, entitled,
        "Application of sections 19 to 21 of the 1995 Act to transport vehicles",
        would apply to the provision of goods, facilities and services to be extended to provision and use of transport vehicles. Bert Massie told me about an assistant on a train, not long ago, who said that as he was disabled and in a wheelchair, it was not a requirement that he should be served. In future, loopholes like that will not be possible.
        Physical changes to transport vehicles are already covered by regulations made under Part 5 of the DDA. The clause clarifies that the current exemption of transport services does not apply to any aspect of transport infrastructure that is covered by the existing provisions. It would also enable regulations to be made to lift the Part 3 exemption for different vehicles at different times and to varying extents so that we can address the characteristics and constraints of different transport services.
        On 29 November, the Department for Transport published draft regulations for consultation, which would apply to public transport services—buses, coaches, trains, taxis and private hire vehicles—vehicle hire, breakdown services and vehicles used on leisure and tourism services. My noble friend Lord Davies of Oldham who, unfortunately, cannot be here today, but who, I think, introduced those regulations, will handle those amendments on behalf of the department in Committee as he has a very real expertise in that field.
        That means, for example, a disabled woman could not he refused access to a bus that was otherwise accessible to her simply because she was disabled—perhaps she had learning difficulties and the bus driver decided on his own behalf to discriminate against her—or it might be reasonable for train staff to take refreshments to disabled passengers at their seats if their wheelchair meant that they could not get easily to the buffet car.
        Clause 6 concerns,
        "Rail vehicles: application of accessibility regulations".
        Regulations made under Part 5 of the DDA require all rail vehicles brought into use after 1998 to be accessible. However, the Act does not allow an "end-date" to be set by which time all rail vehicles must comply. Clause 6 will overcome those shortcomings. Our preferred date for the end-date is 2020, which has been brought forward from the 2025 date on which DfT originally consulted. That

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        would strike a reasonable balance between the cost to the railway industry and the mobility needs of disabled people.
        On refurbishment, the department has indicated that it would apply the accessibility regulations on a "like-forlike" basis. In other words, the amount and type of accessibility enhancement required would be proportionate to the amount and type of refurbishment being undertaken. For example, if a train operator was replacing all the seating in certain vehicles, it would have to install the required number of priority seats for use by disabled people. This would deliver the accessible trains which disabled people are seeking within a fair and reasonable time-frame.
        Clause 6 would also allow for exemptions to be made for all vehicles used on a particular railway, such as a heritage railway, while continuing to ensure consultation with the Disabled Persons Transport Advisory Committee.
        Clauses 7 and 8 also deal with rail vehicles. They provide for a new certification and enforcement regime for rail vehicle accessibility. This would ensure that new rail vehicles, and refurbished ones, complied with the appropriate regulations, providing clarity for disabled people and the rail industry. The enforcement provisions would allow the Secretary of State to take quick and effective action against the operators of non-compliant vehicles.
        Clause 9 concerns the recognition of disabled persons' badges and is a measure relating to the blue badge scheme of parking concessions for disabled people. It would enable legal recognition of disabled people's parking badges issued by other countries, for example those for people from France or Germany, and would add a small change to Schedule 1 to allow for an updating of some of the language used in connection with badges issued to organisations. It will replace the word "institution" which many people now find offensive.
        Clause 10 covers discriminatory advertisements. Since 1 October, employers and others to whom Part II of the DDA applies have been under a duty not to publish discriminatory job adverts. Clause 10 applies the duty to "third party publishers" such as newspapers. For example, a newspaper which published an advert saying that a full driving licence was an essential qualification for a wholly desk-bound job might be liable for discrimination, as well as the employer.
        Clause 11 is a technical provision concerning group insurance and does not address genetic testing or the assessment of disability in individuals in terms of more or less adverse insurance. Rather, it clarifies the coverage of group insurance arranged by an employer with an insurance provider. For example, an insurer contracted to provide health insurance to a group of an employer's staff would be treated the same as when it provides such cover to the public, apart from, as now, that any cases would be heard by employment tribunals.
        Clause 12 is an important new provision dealing with private clubs. It would insert new Sections 21F to 21J into Part III of the DDA so that larger private clubs are
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        covered by the Act. Sections 19 to 21 of the DDA cover the provision of goods, services or facilities. However, private clubs are outside the scope of those provisions. This measure would bring clubs into the DDA, protecting disabled people in the setting of a private organisation, such as a London club or even a political party.
        Members, applicants for membership, associates, guests and potential guests would all be protected from disability discrimination, including failure to make reasonable adjustments. For example, large-print application forms might have to be provided. Alternatively, the disabled wife of a guest would have to be invited to a Christmas dinner on an equal basis to all other wives.
        The detail of the reasonable adjustment duties are not set out in the Bill. We will consult shortly on how and when these duties would come into effect, but we expect them to be analogous to the existing duty on providers of goods and services more broadly.
        Clause 13 covers discrimination in relation to the letting of premises. For the first time, landlords and managers of rented premises would be under a duty to make reasonable adjustments. They might have to change their practices, policies or procedures, change a term of the letting, or provide an auxiliary aid or service for a disabled person. For example, a landlord might have to read out letters about the property 10 a tenant who is blind, or provide a rent book in large print. If there was an accessible door to a block of flats, the landlord might have to allow a wheelchair user to enter and leave through it even if tenants were normally forbidden to do so.
        Clause 13 would insert new sections into the DDA after existing Sections 22 to 24, which deal with the less favourable treatment of disabled people when it comes to the sale or letting of premises. New Sections 24A to 24F deal with the situation where premises have been let to a person, while new Sections 24G to 24J apply to the situation where premises are to be let.
        The duties in these groups mirror each other. Details are set out regarding the duties of reasonable adjustments, while Sections 24B and 24H set out some limited exceptions from the new duties. As far as is practicable, they replicate the existing approach to reasonable adjustments, justifications and regulatory powers which apply to service providers.
        These provisions would help disabled people who are renting or seeking to rent premises. Landlords should not be fearful of them, as they will never have to make adjustments that are unreasonable. A landlord would never have to remove or alter a physical feature of the premises. For example, while he might have to provide a portable ramp if a few steps made access impossible or unreasonably difficult for a wheelchair user, the landlord would not have to alter the steps themselves, or more generally have to widen gateways or doorways. This is consistent with the recommendation made by the Disability Rights Task Force.
        Clause 14 would allow the Government by regulation to amend the small dwellings exception that applies to existing and new premises provisions, which is where

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        there is a resident landlord. For example, it would apply where there is not normally residential accommodation on the premises for more than six people in addition to the landlord and members of the household. At the moment, someone who owns and lives in a premises is exempt. We have powers, if appropriate, to reduce the number of people.
        Clause 15 addresses a matter which I know has been a concern of the noble Baroness, Lady Darcy de Knayth. It relates to general qualifications bodies. The clause would prohibit unlawful discrimination against disabled people by bodies which are not already covered by Part IV of the DDA issuing general qualifications. Vocational qualifications are already covered by the DDA. "Relevant qualifications", such as A-levels and GCSEs in England and Wales and their equivalents in Scotland, can be prescribed under powers in new Section 31AA. This would be done following consultations with Scottish Ministers and the National Assembly for Wales.
        The approach adopted in the remaining new sections for defining unlawful discrimination and harassment, and providing reasonable adjustments, mirrors that in Sections 14A and 14B of the DDA for vocational qualifications. For example, an examination board might have to agree that a visually impaired student could have someone read out exam questions to him and write down his answers. As with those provisions, we have recognised the importance of maintaining standards as we increase opportunities. We also have powers of enforcement.
        I turn now to the final few clauses. Clause 16 covers the generalisation of Section 56 of the 1995 Act in relation to Part III claims. The clause extends to areas like the provision of goods and services an existing procedure whereby a disabled person can ask questions about alleged discrimination in relation to employment, allowing the disabled person to produce a better legal case if appropriate.
        Clause 17 addresses the meaning of "disability". Section 1 of the DDA defines the meaning of disability for the purposes of the Act, while Schedule 1 elaborates on that definition. The clause would abolish the requirement in Schedule 1 that a mental illness must be "clinically well recognised", thus implementing a recommendation of the scrutiny committee. In other words, someone who clearly has a mental illness could be covered by the DDA even if it is difficult, at an early stage in the diagnosis, to name the precise condition.
        Clause 17 would also introduce new paragraph 6A in Schedule 1 deeming people who have HIV, cancer or MS to be disabled, extending coverage to those groups. We shall consult shortly on using the powers set out in Clause 17 to exclude cancers which would not require substantial treatment, as recommended by the task force. I mention, for example, conditions such as minor melanomas which can be removed in one session of treatment. A further example is that of a person recently diagnosed with HIV, but experiencing no symptoms. He would be protected against discrimination from diagnosis of the condition in all the circumstances that people symptomatic of
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        HIV are currently protected from, including if they were dismissed as a result of revealing the diagnosis. Clause 17 would also ensure that the regulation-making powers under Schedule 1 could be used more flexibly to deem people as disabled in line with the scrutiny committee's recommendations.
        Clauses 18 and 19, along with the remaining schedules, are minor and consequential.
        This Bill completes our promise to deliver comprehensive and enforceable civil rights for disabled people. I commend it with pleasure to the House.
        Moved, That the Bill be now read a second time.—(Baroness Hollis of Heigham.)
        3.29 p.m.
        Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, the House will be grateful to the Minister for the careful way in which she introduced the Bill, for which disabled people have been waiting for a very long time. It is a measure to counter discrimination against disabled people, which regretfully still goes on. In her speech the Minister cited several instances to illustrate that.
        The legislation is also by definition very complicated in that it builds, not for the first time, on an Act of Parliament which had its inception in the time of the last Conservative government. As the noble Baroness said, last year, this Government made further additions to the Act by order in the field of transport. The Opposition were pleased to see those additions, as, on the whole, we are to see this Bill. However, both are legislation by reference.
        The result of the two amendments—the order and the Bill—is that the legislation as a whole is difficult to comprehend. The pre-legislative scrutiny committee, so convincingly chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Carter—to whom I pay tribute—must have found reading through the whole subject as difficult as I have. Indeed, it alluded to that point in its excellent report. It requested, as I did in responding to the regulations last year. that once the current Bill has been enacted, the three pieces of legislation should be consolidated, perhaps under a new title. While I agree with the committee on that—something that I cannot do on every recommendation—I strongly believe that for our consideration of the Bill we need something of this sort much, much faster. The noble Baroness has facilities that are not available to us. I would therefore press her strongly to make a Keeling-type schedule available before we start Grand Committee.
        Turning to the Bill itself, I start from the proposition—which I hope cannot be gainsaid —that disabled people are people first, disabled second and discriminated against in their various activities third. It therefore follows that, despite their disabilities, whether mental or physical, they should not be put in a more advantaged position than able-bodied people. I have looked at the Bill and the Joint Committee's report in that light.
        In this speech I should like to comment not so much on the Bill itself but on some of the recommendations of the Joint Committee, which decided to stick to the policy of the Bill and to ignore the drafting. There will

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        no doubt be drafting points in Committee, and the noble Baroness, in particular, will appreciate that I would not be running true to form if I did not make them. However, when all is said and done, Second Reading should be about policy and nothing else.
        A major change to policy has been that the Government now recognise that HIV/AIDS, cancer and multiple sclerosis should be recognised as disabilities. Although I welcome that, I find it very odd that the Bill may not cover all cancers. I know that the noble Baroness has said a little about that, but I still find it very odd that some cancers may be excluded by future orders. We shall certainly probe this matter much further in Committee.
        I also question the Government's approach to depression. I accept that, by definition, mental illness is treatable. Nevertheless, it is not normally treatable very quickly. I do not think that the Joint Committee was unreasonable in its request that depression should be definable by the number of times it presents itself.
        Consistent with my general approach to the Bill, I do not believe that it is the place to deal with non-disabled people. Therefore, people who are associated with disability should be excluded from its provisions. As the noble Baroness mentioned, there is a plethora of other anti-discrimination legislation and they should be covered by that. Nor do I believe that anyone on disability benefits should automatically fall within its provisions, especially in the current climate of suspicion that a number of disability claimants should be on unemployment benefit.
        The Bill contains a most peculiar clause in regard to the Armed Forces, members of which, despite what the Joint Committee says, are not and should not be covered by the Bill. I agree with the Government on that. However, why on earth are they to be covered when—and, it appears, only when—they are employed at the Government Communications Headquarters? It would, after all, not be unusual for them to switch from there to front-line duties and vice versa.
        Turning to transport issues, which are of major concern to disabled people, we welcome the fact that the Government came moderately clean on the subject of an end date for the suitable adaptation of railway carriages last week by announcing that the end date for completion will be 2020 rather than five years later. However, there is some confusion in my mind about when that will obviate the need for exemption certificates, which of course are very much a part of the Bill as currently drafted.
        As to whether DRC codes of practice should be made by affirmative or negative order, I have no doubt that your Lordships' Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee will have something to say on the matter. I await its findings with interest.
        There is a great deal in the Bill in regard to public authorities. It is noteworthy that the legislation does not cover Members of Parliament, or even the Government, in carrying out their duties; everything is about regional and locally elected people and their appointees. I find that very strange, especially when
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        Members of the Scottish Parliament are to be included in certain circumstances. All, I believe, are overdue for coverage.
        I agree, however, that quangos need to be excluded from the provision, but only as and when they disappear from the political map. As to a duty for them to promote good relations in their areas of operation. I confess to being rather agnostic. For now, I am prepared to give the Government the benefit of the doubt. As I am on the subject of compliance notices, we had more than enough of those in the Pensions Bill, without having any more.
        Access to housing is a basic human right for all our citizens. Clearly, suitable adaptations will be necessary in a large number of cases. I noted the committee's recommendation that a landlord should not unreasonably withhold his consent to the making of physical alterations. That is obviously a problem, but it is one of the most expensive suggestions that the committee made. For the Government to say, "Well, it is only 16p maximum per rented dwelling", does not portray the full picture, as that is clearly an average figure across the whole rented sector.
        The figure will be very much larger for houses and flats that need to be adapted to be suitable for letting to disabled people—totalling, I see again from the RIA, somewhat more than half a million pounds. I believe that the Government realise that, which is why they have stated in the Bill that landlords should not be compelled to take steps that would involve the removal or alteration of a physical feature. The noble Baroness mentioned doorways. To my mind, stairways would be a suitable addition to the list—as would stair-lifts, which are expensive to install, difficult to mount, and, unless the building is continuously used for disabled people, would have to be removed for re-letting to an able-bodied person.
        I agree with the Government that tenants should not be able to make such alterations without the landlord's consent. We strongly believe, though, that it is necessary to have a register of affordable housing, both for disabled people and for the general rented stock. I am encouraged by the words of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, when speaking recently on the Housing Bill, that such a thing would be useful. We will probe in Committee whether that would be appropriate for the discrete purposes of this Bill.
        The Bill quite rightly covers discriminatory advertisements for employment, an issue which has occasionally been a problem. The Government, it seems, have not found such advertisements dealing with the provision of goods, facilities or services. Have they consulted the Disability Rights Commission on that? I am surprised that there does not seem to be a problem, as the Government seem to be saying. Legislation on the issue would, at the very least, stop a mischief at source.
        The activities of employment tribunals also came under discussion in the Joint Committee, which requested that there should be a power to insist on the reinstatement or re-engagement of an employee in disability discrimination cases. I would have thought

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        that if such a power were necessary, tribunals could use their existing powers to order just that. It would be helpful if the noble Baroness, when she replies to the debate, could confirm whether I am right.
        I am glad that the Government have now seen fit to include general qualification bodies within the scope of the legislation. The move could, however, be seen as the start down a slippery slope. Bodies awarding professional qualifications—what the Government call "awarding bodies"—will sometimes be included and sometimes they will not. It would be useful to have a list of which of them will be in and which will be ruled out.
        We should also consider the Joint Committee's recommendations requesting a review or consultation exercise. That would include reviewing the eligibility criteria for all disability benefits. I have uncoupled this from my earlier comments on passporting from benefit to coverage under the Bill. I should like to hear from the Minister that all the benefits for which her department are responsible are being kept under continuous review.
        Other recommendations relate to reviewing the application of the duty on listed authorities to assess whether amendment is required; consulting on and then producing a code of practice for volunteers, resulting, if necessary, in a regulation-making power enabling volunteers under the umbrella of the Bill; and reviewing the case for a support fund for volunteers. I am surprised that the Government are not even prepared to consider all these areas. Although the consideration might come to nothing, at the end of the day they would have lost nothing by taking these recommendations more seriously than they appear to have done so far.
        Lastly, this is a Bill that, like almost all Department for Work and Pensions legislation, is littered with regulation-making powers. I have no doubt that some regulations will already be in draft, and that the department has a pretty good idea of when it hopes to lay them. It would be extremely helpful to all noble Lords if the Minister would let us have sight of them as soon as possible in our consideration of the Bill. In the immediate past, she has been extremely good in this regard, and I trust that she will not blot her copybook now.
        This is a needed Bill which could be made better. My noble friend Lord Higgins and I will do all in our power to make it so.
        3.41 p.m.
        Lord Oakeshott of Seagrove Bay: My Lords, the way in which we treat disabled people in our country is the mark of a civilised society. I therefore salute the Bill as a signpost towards the society that we all want to build.
        I hope that noble Lords can hear me. As noble Lords may have gathered, I am partially vocally disabled this afternoon but, unlike most disablement, it will soon pass. As a new boy on the Front Bench, I start by paying tribute to my colleague, Paul Holmes, our shadow Minister for the disabled in another place, and my noble friend Lord Addington, who will wind up
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        this afternoon from these Benches, for their help and advice to me and for their doughty campaigning for the disabled over many years.
        When I saw that the Bill was being introduced, my first reaction after the rigours of the Pensions Bill, with all the battles and the time that we had spent on it, was what doctors call "heart sink", not just for myself, but also for the Minister, after her sterling efforts. But what a contrast this is. We have a draft Bill that has been carefully considered and which has had proper pre-legislative scrutiny and we have had a well-argued and basically sensible response from the Government to the Select Committee's recommendations. So, as the Disability Rights Commission suggested, let us get the Bill on the statute book as soon as possible.
        Many noble Lords in this House have lived with disability at first hand and are in a unique position to scrutinise the Bill with the expertise of experience. Many of us who are not in that position may nevertheless have had temporary experience of mobility problems. Just before I entered the House, I was run over. I broke several ribs and my leg, which was in plaster for two months. It was quite difficult to learn to walk on crutches with broken ribs. I was very lucky. My wife is a doctor, I had plenty of money for taxis and I knew that my disability was time-limited. But it was still a salutary experience. If one can only use one hand, it takes a lot longer than double the time to clear a table and load a dishwasher. People do not treat one the same when one is in a wheelchair or on crutches. At St Thomas's Hospital, after my leg was set, I would have been blocking an NHS bed for at least another day if I had not argued long and hard with the porter, who was quite sure he knew best about which ward I had to return to after my X-ray. He did not. Soon after I was back at work, I went to a grand commercial property function where I knew most of the movers and shakers. Normally, we would all be circulating, keeping in the swim and perhaps picking up the odd deal. Not for me that time, on my crutches. I was stuck in the corner and only a couple of old friends dropped by to talk to me, out of charity as I thought.
        On transport, taxis worked well, once I had learnt how to kneel down to get into them. My 159 Routemaster bus with a conductor was fine. But the new, single-manned No. 3 was a nightmare, with sudden stops and starts—I think that must be the automatic transmission—so that I was knocked off my crutches twice, and had several near-misses. My worst travel experience of all was flying from Heathrow to Edinburgh. Despite buying two tickets, as required, and giving advance notice to British Airways, the wheelchair at Heathrow was very late both ways. I very nearly missed the flight. I shall not forget in a hurry feeling so isolated and helpless. That was my experience on a very temporary and short-term basis.
        Many noble Lords accompany people who rely on wheelchairs and walking aids and they are all too well aware of the difficulties that disabled people face all the time, for example, steps without rails into public buildings, steep kerbs and uneven pavements. In particular, central London is not a disabled-friendly place. That is probably because of the age of its buildings, but there is no excuse for the problems not

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        to be solved. To give an example, last week I went to Westminster Cathedral with a person with walking difficulties for the splendid Parliamentary Choir concert in which the Minister, my wife and others sang so beautifully. But even there, the main entrance had steps with no handrail. We owe it to disabled people—and, looking some years ahead, this may well be an appeal to the enlightened self-interest of many of us in this House—to make life more accessible than it is now.
        More and more people live longer and longer. Inevitably, this means more and more people with mobility problems. There are now about 10 million such people in all. Most of these people are used to leading active, useful and full lives and are anxious to play their part in society in spite of their difficulties. Their default position is to live their lives in the world of the able-bodied, not to be treated as different and needing special treatment. In leisure time, they make every effort to go to the theatre, the cinema, concerts, festivals, sporting events and so on. It is clear that actions already taken, thanks to the earlier Act, such as the provision of disabled lavatories, mean that many disabled people now have the confidence to go to venues knowing that they will not have to cross difficult roads or find less accessible public conveniences closed.
        But it is even more important that disabled people should have access to work through more accessible transport. In view of the substantial cost implications, this is the area of the Bill that we will need to scrutinise and consider most closely in Committee. I am very grateful to my noble friend Lord Bradshaw for his advice on this as he has a lifetime's experience on the railways. Clearly, there are several key questions that we will have to consider. In particular, will the Minister say how many people who want to travel, by train in particular, use wheelchairs or have severe difficulties in travelling? If she cannot answer now, will she answer when we come to Committee?
        I shall give one example as regards buses. There is not much point in making sure that we have kneeling buses if no effective action is being taken to ensure that parked cars are cleared from bus stops so that those buses can get right up to the pavement.
        When dealing with disablement, we need to bear in mind that there is no such thing as "free money" in the equation. There is no separate disabled budget. All expenditure on the disabled has to come out of what would otherwise be spent on service improvement for public transport in general. That is not an argument against the expenditure, but it is an argument for clarity and consistency and for being clear about what we are asking for. In particular, is the appropriate date for full compliance for the railways 2017 or 2020? The regulatory impact assessment suggests that to make the date 2017 rather than 2020 would more than double the cost: £350 million compared to £170 million. I find that a surprising statistic and we will probe it in Committee. None the less, these improvements are clearly not cost-free and it is very important that improvement is done in a way that does not interfere with the general service to other people.
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        A recent survey by Leonard Cheshire shows that 60 per cent of households with a disabled member do not have access to a car, compared to 27 per cent of the general population. About half the people in that survey said that inaccessible transport restricted their choice of jobs or that they had been forced to turn down a job interview because of it. These are matters that we need to take very seriously. In general. both the regulatory impact assessment and the Government's response strike me as fair and balanced. Most of society and all parts of this House are united on the aims of the Bill. The need is for the disabled and those dealing with them to know exactly where they stand and for Parliament to have the full facts on the costs and who will pay.
        I should like to give one further example on cost from my business experience as an investment manager dealing with commercial property. The regulatory impact assessment estimates the cost of adjusting buildings for disabled tenants on page 29 and says:
        "It is envisaged that landlords will seek to recover these costs through rent increases".
        If we are talking about commercial property, how will that be done? Will it be reasonable to include an increase in rent as part of giving consent for alterations to the premises? Does the Minister agree that the regulatory impact assessment significantly underestimates the number of premises likely to be affected because it considers only the numbers of disabled people actually starting their own business or renting premises directly, not the much larger number of disabled people who are working in other business premises which are not rented by disabled people.
        The disabled are well served by the charities which fight their corner. Both my noble friend Lord Addington and I have received many well argued briefings, and look forward to having more detailed discussions with the disabled groups as the Bill progresses.
        As a new boy, I have found the common front projected or presented by the Disability Rights Commission on behalf of Leonard Cheshire, Mencap, Mind, RADAR, the Royal National Institute of the Blind, the Royal National Institute for Deaf People and Scope, especially helpful and effective.
        I should also flag up concerns about Clause 3, which creates a duty on public authorities to promote disability equality, which I have received from Barbara Cohen, one of the special advisers to the Joint Committee, and my noble friend Lord Lester of Herne Hill. They have suggestions, if I can put it in layman's language, for read-across from the Race Relations Act.
        As a fellow special adviser to Roy Jenkins at the Home Office many years ago, I always stuck to economics and politics and left the legal and human rights arguments to my noble friend Lord Lester, and I look forward to hearing his superb advocacy in Committee.
        We on these Benches welcome the Bill; we wish it Godspeed, and will do our best to help it pass into law before it is overtaken by the general election.
        3.52 p.m.
        Lord Carter: My Lords, like other noble Lords and the disability organisations that are connected with the Bill, I welcome it and the Government's repeated commitment that it will become law by the end of this Parliament.
        As my noble friend the Minister pointed out, the Bill is one of a number introduced by the Government in the past five years that has sought to deal with discrimination against disabled people and their civil rights. I refer to the Disability Rights Commission Act 1999, the Special Educational Needs and Disability Act 2001, the Mental Capacity Bill, which is awaiting its Third Reading in the Commons and this Bill which, as we know, is based on the Disability Discrimination Act 1995. For completeness, I should also mention the draft Mental Health Bill, which is now being considered by a Joint Select Committee of which I am a member.
        The Government can be rightly proud of their record in bringing forward legislation to help end the continuing discrimination, in all its forms, against disabled people. Mention of this array of legislation reinforces a recommendation made by the Joint Select Committee on this Bill that the Government should ensure that each piece of legislation is consistent with all the others. For example, the Joint Select Committee considering the draft Mental Health Bill is finding very real problems relating to its provisions to the Mental Capacity Bill, the Mental Health Act 1983 and the Children Act. This Bill is, in a sense, more straightforward, since it is based on existing legislation—the 1995 Act—and it should be easier to check against other legislation. I hope that my noble friend will be able to assure us that the department intends to do this.
        As the chairman of the Joint Select Committee on this Bill, I am glad to take this first opportunity to thank our special advisers, Jenny Morris and Barbara Cohen, and our Clerk, Jake Vaughan, and his staff for their excellent advice and support.
        I am obviously pleased that the Government have accepted a number of the major recommendations we made. But my noble friend will not be surprised to learn that, along with other noble Lords, we shall wish to explore with the Government those recommendations that they did not accept. I have no doubts that amendments will be tabled to assist the Government in this regard.
        I will not take up the time of the House by listing the substantial changes to the draft Bill which have been made by the Government, with one exception. That is the amendment of the definition of disability in respect of people with mental illness. The requirement in the 1995 Act is that mental illness must be "clinically well recognised". Although the wording was well intentioned, I do not think that either William Hague, the Minister at the time, or anybody else understood its full implications. The direct effect is that it is harder for people with mental illness to get protection from discrimination than those with physical illness. That is. in itself, discriminatory. So the acceptance by the Government of our recommendation for change has been very widely welcomed.
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        The definition of disability and mental illness illustrates the whole question of whether the definition of disability should be based on the social model or on the medical model, as in the 1995 Act and in this Bill. The social model attempts to define disabling barriers rather than medically defined impairment. To use the simple example we quoted on page 21 of our report, a disabled person might say, "My impairment is the fact that I can't walk; my disability is the fact that the bus company only provides buses which are inaccessible". The social model recognises that environment produces discrimination—the medical model merely describes impairment.
        The Joint Select Committee recognised all the advantages of adopting the social model, but we took the pragmatic view that it would be difficult to use this Bill, which is based on the medical model, to insert a general and a social model of disability into the Bill, thereby almost certainly delaying its introduction substantially.
        A lot of the problems associated with disability discrimination would be overcome by focusing on the act of discrimination and not the extent of impairment. We hope that the Disability Rights Commission will concentrate on this approach when reviewing the operation of the Act.
        Although the Bill is extremely welcome, I turn briefly to another area where many of its provisions could be improved. As the Minister pointed out, Clauses 2 and 3 make it unlawful for a public authority to discriminate against a disabled person in carrying out its functions. They place a new and positive statutory duty on public authorities when carrying out their functions. This is clearly very welcome. However, the Select Committee, reflecting the very weighty evidence that we received, recommended that alongside the duty to provide equality of opportunity, there should be an equivalent duty to promote good relations between disabled and non-disabled people.
        I have read with great care the Government's response in rejecting this recommendation. But sadly, as I lack any qualification in linguistic philosophy, I could not make head or tail of it. I hope that the Minister will explain exactly what the Government meant when they said that the recommendation to promote good relations between disabled and non-disabled people was not acceptable.
        The Minister, Maria Eagle, was extremely helpful when she met the Joint Select Committee. On this particular matter, it is worth quoting her comments, which appear on page 265 of the evidence volume. She said:
        "If somebody can explain to me why this is necessary and what good it would do and how it would work then I am perfectly willing to listen to it. I think there are differences in this legislation and other equality legislation which makes this less relevant in respect of disability, but obviously I am willing to be persuaded".
        My noble friend will not be surprised to learn that amendments will be tabled to try to persuade the Government to change their stance on this matter. If the words "promote good relations" create a problem, I am

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        sure that we can think of alternatives. One example would be "promoting the social inclusion of disabled people".
        Other noble Lords will wish to raise other matters, such as landlord and tenant, transport and education, so I shall not go into any detail on them. To add to the words of the noble Lord, Lord Oakeshott, the one aspect of daily life that causes the most frustration for disabled people is the lack of accessible transport. Journeys which to non-disabled people are quite straightforward become major exercises in logistics, and disabled people need to do much forward planning for every journey they make.
        This Bill is very welcome. It goes a long way to dismantle many of the barriers that face disabled people in their daily lives. As always, this House will examine it, with its usual ability to explore and improve. I am equally sure that the House will do nothing to impede its speedy progress on to the statute book.
        4 p.m.
        The Lord Bishop of Salisbury: My Lords, I, too, welcome the proposals to extend the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, and in particular the opportunity to express the hope that the shift in focus of disability anti-discrimination legislation should be on the act of discrimination, rather than on the nature and extent of a person's impairment—that is to say, the "social" rather than the "medical" focus, as the Joint Committee on the Bill puts it. Where are the barriers to full participation in our common life?
        In response to these proposals, I wish to make two points. The first is in support of moving to the social focus—the focus on discrimination. Discriminating between people is not, however, merely a social matter; there is something much deeper. In the Judaeo-Christian tradition and its framework, within which our culture and legislation are formed, there is a developed understanding of each human person as made in the divine image. That means that we are to look at each person as a reflection in some sense of the godhead, and to be valued for that. The Judaic blessing to be said on seeing a disabled or deformed person says:
        "Blessed are thou, Lord God, king of the universe, who variest the forms of thy creatures".
        So we are to look at each person in this positive light, not only for who they are but for what they can contribute, not in isolation but as members of our social community. That is why I am particularly concerned that we pay attention to the question of the barriers, as the noble Lord, Lord Carter, has just described them.
        My second point is that, because of what I have just said, it is in the social context of schools, hospitals and prisons and in places of social interaction that the practicalities of this Bill are so significant. We need to ensure—and here I shall use the example of deaf persons—that those people have adequate and rapid access to those who can sign in an appropriate language. I highlight the problems posed by deaf people because there is nothing so isolating as deafness. The profoundly hard of hearing cannot
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        engage socially, as can those who can hear, partly because this disability is so superficially invisible. It is for that reason that the Churches place this disability on the top of their agenda for disabled people. Indeed, the Church of England has special chaplains for deaf people, and special deaf churches.
        The problems raised by that constituency highlight an important series of social engagements at key moments in people's lives. I hope that the developed legislation will take account of those engagements and describe in some way how they are to be handled. First, there are problems when deaf people are in contact with the police. Because such events happen at a moment's notice, it is not always possible to ensure the kind of provision that one can perhaps ensure in a more settled institution, when people book in and make appointments. How are we going to help the police to develop a pattern of advice and consultancy that is rapidly and readily available?
        Similarly, in the criminal justice system, there are potential problems for those who are deaf and hard of hearing. That may also apply to those from ethnic minorities for whom English is not their second or perhaps even their third language—as well as, more obviously, for those who are deaf. I know that there has been some difficulty for members of the prison chaplaincy service in enabling the deaf chaplains who work in the diocese to gain access to prisons. In the past that has certainly not always been an easy point to resolve with the Home Office and the Prison Service. I hope that some thought and advice will be given, in the wake of the legislation, to making that possible.
        Hospitals represent another social context in which deaf persons in particular need to be sure that they have understood what patterns of treatment are being proposed. We need to give our formal consent, as adults, to any proposed treatment, and people are overawed by the context of hospitals anyway. If people cannot understand what is being proposed at such key points in their lives, when informed decisions need to be made, that is another area in which they need enormous degrees of support.
        In education, visible access to school buildings and centres for night school and college is, of course, important. But what provisions are there for education for those who are particularly hard of hearing? Where are the thresholds and barriers that make it difficult for people to gain access to education provisions and skills—people who may have a very developed intellectual life and, indeed, may need it much more than perhaps we do, because they are deprived of other forms of social interaction?
        Within the framework of all the disability discrimination legislation., I hope that the Minister will consider the details of all those social contexts, as the detail of the new legislation takes visible shape in Committee. I hope that in summing up, she will be able to say what particular action the Government will take in the particular areas that I mentioned, especially for the deaf and hard of hearing.
        4.7 p.m.
        Lord Ashley of Stoke: My Lords, the first thing that I want to do is warmly to congratulate the Government on the Bill. It helps to fill a yawning gap in the Disability Discrimination Act 1995—in fact, a number of yawning gaps—and firmly establishes new rights for Britain's disabled people. That is a great thing, and the Government deserve a pat on the back.
        I would like to express my appreciation to the Ministers concerned, particularly the Secretary of State, Alan Johnson, Maria Eagle, the Minister for Disabled People, and our own noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, for their assiduous work on the Bill. There was a great deal of discussion before the Bill appeared, and I know what a heavy load the Ministers have had in introducing these measures. Progress on the Bill has also been helped by the task force, and the joint scrutiny committee, chaired by the inimitable noble Lord, Lord Carter. So there has been no shortage of consultation. For that matter, there has been no shortage of first-class briefings, particularly from the Disability Rights Commission and the organisations which make up the Disability Charities Consortium.
        There are many very welcome proposals mentioned by my noble friend Lady Hollis. The ones that I particularly welcome are the provision for promoting disability equality in the public sector, the extension of the DDA for most duties of public authorities, new rights for disabled tenants, improvements for mental health service users, and new rights to use public transport, as well as various others. Their combined effect will have an enormous impact on the lives of millions of disabled people.
        For all that, the Bill could be improved. For example, I was sorry to see that of the joint scrutiny committee's 75 admirable proposals, much more than half have not been accepted by the Government. Since the joint committee's proposals would have further extended the rights of disabled people, a good opportunity has been missed by the Government.
        In the course of our debates, especially in Committee, we shall be able to explain our reservations and suggestions for improvements. But having said that, I must frankly explain our dilemma. This Bill is so necessary to combat the wretched discrimination faced daily by many disabled people, and it is so good that we want to get it through without delay. The All-Party Disability Group, which welcomes the Bill, has, with others, been pressing for it for years, and to delay it now would be a very bitter blow indeed. Therefore, we do not want any undue delay even though we want to put forward suggestions for improving the Bill. We want to see the improvements. I hope that the dialogue we have with the Government means we have a speedy resolution of these controversial points.
        Although the Bill extends the DDA duties on landlords and management companies, and obliges them to make reasonable adjustments to policies, practices and procedures, it does not provide tenants with a definite right to make reasonable adaptations. That right is absolutely crucial. Without that right disabled people lack freedom in their own homes. Permanent restrictions
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        are imposed on their living quarters. The house becomes a prison rather than a home. I hope that the Government will reconsider the Bill and move to prevent landlords from unreasonably withholding consent for changes. Nothing could be fairer than that.
        The Bill's proposal to impose a duty on the public sector to promote equality for disabled people is very welcome. However, there are some disturbing unofficial reports that schools are to be exempted. Perhaps my noble friend will tell me whether there is any substance in those unofficial reports. To my mind this simply does not make sense. Schools are unambiguously part of the public sector and none could be more important than them for formulating future attitudes to disabled people.
        I want the Government to act swiftly and comprehensively on this issue. By "comprehensively" I mean it will not be good enough if schools are to be given a general duty rather than the detailed specific duty imposed on others. The general duty would simply mean that schools would not have to produce an invaluable disability equality scheme so they could not be compelled to comply. Apart from that, the omission of schools sends the wrong message to the public—a message that in the Government's view improving relations is not important and that the public sector need not bother. That is a lamentable message. I hope that it will not go out from this Government. It is unacceptable and I very much hope that my noble friend can help us.
        The Bill's welcome proposal to make the public sector promote equality of opportunity makes it all the more strange that the Government have refused also to impose a duty to promote good relations between disabled and non-disabled people in the public sector, as was mentioned by my noble friend a moment ago. This is a serious omission because the level of hostility to disabled people, apart from and in addition to discrimination, is really appalling, even today. The public sector could play a very important role in easing the tension and building up good relations if the Government were prepared to bring back the idea of promoting good relations. My noble friend Lord Carter wants an explanation of why the Government did not include that provision. I hope that my noble friend will not try to justify the Government's stand to my noble friend Lord Carter. Rather she should say, "We will introduce the measure". That would satisfy me, my noble friend Lord Carter and all the other speakers in this debate. It would be a nice, simple, easy solution. I offer it with the best intentions in the world.
        As regards transport, I am at a loss to understand why the Government are insisting on setting the rail end date at the year 2020. Is that acceptable? By 2017 the train companies will have had nearly 20 years to make their trains accessible. The Government are leaning over backwards to oblige them, but in doing so they are simply adding to the frustration of disabled people who suffer endless inconvenience when using public transport. I hope very much to see a change of end date.
        On the issue of mental illness, I am delighted that the Government have made excellent changes, but I think they are being unrealistic by insisting on retaining the

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        12-month qualifying period in cases of depression. Everyone, even laymen, knows that depression is often intermittent and episodes may not last for a 12-month period. The sooner the false test is dropped, the better.
        The final point I wish to make on the Bill is that I am sorry there is no provision for independent living for disabled people. This is the next main aim and would be of enormous benefit to disabled people. In essence, independent living means that disabled people have a right to choose who helps them and who they live with; a right to make choices and to live in the community, not in residential care.
        When this Bill goes through we shall monitor its detailed provisions very carefully and seek to ensure full implementation, thereby enriching the lives of millions of disabled people. I again warmly congratulate my noble friend Lady Hollis and her colleagues. I wish the Bill Godspeed.
        4.17 p.m.
        Lord Rix: My Lords, I rise to welcome this Bill and am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this very important Second Reading debate.
        I would like to declare an interest as president of the Royal Mencap Society and as a member of the joint parliamentary committee which scrutinised the draft Bill under the excellent chairmanship of the noble Lord, Lord Carter.
        I have no doubt that this legislation has the potential to make a very significant difference to the lives of disabled people. The public sector duty alone could transform society for the better if properly implemented and resourced.
        But the theme of my speech today, which I regret to say is a trifle longer than is my wont, is the need for this Bill to touch the lives of all disabled people and particularly one of the most excluded of all groups—people with a learning disability.
        There are 1.5 million people in the United Kingdom with a learning disability—that is around 15 per cent of the total population of disabled people. Of this 1.5 million, only about 10 per cent of working age have paid work—as against about 50 per cent of disabled people generally.
        Around 90 per cent of people with a learning disability will also have been bullied in the past year—two-thirds on a regular basis. Again this is compared to an already utterly disgraceful 50 per cent of disabled people generally (according to the most recent DRC survey which was undertaken in Scotland).
        It will not surprise the Minister that the need for this Bill to tackle hate crimes is something I will return to later in my speech, and no doubt will return to at considerable length at Committee stage.
        People with a learning disability also have significantly poorer health and are much more likely to die before the age of 50 than the general population. Yet, despite this, people with a learning disability have much greater difficulty accessing appropriate healthcare services.
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        I am painting this picture of a group of people who for many years have been among the most socially excluded of disability groups, who have always been the group to miss out on advances in disability rights, who have always been the group that it is deemed acceptable to ignore, because I would like your Lordships to keep this in mind as I turn to two major proposals in this Bill—the removal of the public transport exemption and the public sector duty to promote equality.
        I first turn to public transport. Much has been made of how important the removal of the exemption on public transport will be for disabled people. I do not wish to downplay its significance.
        For disabled people in particular, inaccessible public transport has a major negative impact on their independence, social participation, employability and health. And for many disabled people the removal of this exemption holds the key to social inclusion. As such, it has to be warmly welcomed, and, as already mentioned, the Government announced last Monday, 29 November, that their preferred end date by which all rail vehicles will have to meet the Rail Vehicle Accessibility Regulations 1998 is 2020. My preferred date, as well as the DRC's and that of the Joint Committee is 2017, although I shall then be aged 93 and if I am still around by then I do not suppose that I shall be using the trains very much. If the fares keep rocketing, I do not suppose many other senior citizens will be either; certainly not disabled people, with the costs at the moment.
        The surveys show that among the things that matter most to people with a learning disability are signs and travel information that can be easily understood; audio and visual information on hoard trains and buses, and proper disability awareness training for transport staff.
        I have heard time and again that this Bill is the culmination of many years of work and that it marks the end of a process of fulfilling the Government's pledge to disabled people on public transport. But for all this talk of fully accessible public transport, this Bill will do absolutely nothing to improve audio and visual route and destination information on board buses, which incidentally is the mode of transport that people with a learning disability most want to take. I am realistic enough to know that we are not going to get any movement in this area through this Bill. That battle was lost well before the Bill was even in draft form.
        However, I would like reassurance that if a train or bus already has audio-visual equipment on board, that transport staff would have a duty to ensure that it works; that it is on and that it is set at the right volume and for the right destination. I would like reassurance that the Government will heed the Joint Committee's recommendation to ensure that the installation of audio-visual equipment on board trains will also be made a priority through this Bill.
        What of proper disability awareness training for transport staff? Have you seen how many of them behave towards learning-disabled potential passengers

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        at bus stops? Many people with a learning disability may have difficulty speaking, difficulty understanding a complex timetable, or difficulty working out the right money to pay for their fares. This can lead to impatient transport staff and passengers being rude to them, bullying them, or even refusing to allow them on board the bus or the train.
        The Government have said that bringing transport services under Part 3 will mean that transport operators will need to have proper disability awareness training. I very much hope that is the case, and I look forward to the Minister providing reassurance that people with non-physical disabilities, who often have very different needs, will not simply be considered as an afterthought, or indeed not considered at all.
        I am sure that the Minister would agree with me that it is just as important that transport staff are trained properly on how to recognise and deal fairly and sympathetically with the difficulties faced by people with non-physical disabilities, as it is for them to be trained properly on how to deal with physically disabled passengers.
        As such, I hope that any guidance and information that the Department for Transport produces to assist transport operators, and any codes of practice that the DRC produces in conjunction with the Department for Transport, will comprehensively consider the needs of people with non-physical disabilities.
        I turn now to the second major proposal in this Bill, that of the public sector duty to promote equality. Again, I would like to stress the theme of my speech; the need for this Bill to help all groups of disabled people. The first issue that I wanted to bring up in relation to the public sector duty is the very important point raised by the Joint Committee in its report; that of independent advocacy.
        I am hoping that the Minister will be able to provide a reassurance that where the public sector duty clause states that there is,
        "the need to take steps to take account of disabled persons' disabilities, even where that involves treating disabled persons more favourably than other persons".
        I hope that is an oblique reference to the need for people with a learning disability, and anyone else with support needs or communication difficulties, to have appropriate access to an independent advocate as required. If it is such an oblique reference, and it does mean that, then the Government are to be warmly congratulated, as the Minister will know that I and a number of my colleagues feel very strongly about this issue.
        Another issue that I wanted to raise in relation to the public sector duty is one that I am sure the Minister is going to hear many, many times in the next few weeks; that is, the duty to promote good relations. I quoted some of the latest statistics on hate crimes against disabled people at the beginning of my speech, and the Minister will be well aware of the now overwhelming evidence, so I will not dwell on it. What is clear is that
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        tackling hate crimes, and the causes of hate crimes, on an individual-by-individual reactive basis is never going to solve the problem. We have through this Bill a golden opportunity proactively to tackle this issue, but it will be missed if the public sector duty remains unamended.
        For as long as disabled people cannot go outside their own homes for fear of being attacked, for fear of being spat at, for fear of being ignored, of being harassed, of being picked on, of being beaten up, then we might as well just bin the rest of this Bill right now, because it will not make one iota of difference to the lives of disabled people, for whom hate crimes are an everyday occurrence.
        Frankly, I really do not mind whether we use a good relations duty, as recommended by the Joint Committee, or something else to fill this clear policy gap, as long as we fill it. Again, I stress that this is something about which I feel very strongly; it is something about which the Joint Committee felt very strongly; and about which I know the whole of the disability community feels very strongly. As such, I trust that the Minister is open to being convinced of the need for an explicit duty proactively to tackle hate crimes, the causes of hate crimes, and to fill this policy gap.
        I will leave comments on the very important issues of healthcare and education in relation to the public sector duty to others, and instead raise as my final point the issue of employment. I mentioned at the beginning of my speech that people with a learning disability are five times less likely than disabled people generally to have paid jobs. Levels of employment among people with a learning disability may well have actually fallen since the Valuing People White Paper was published, even though raising employment rates is one of its key goals. This is despite the fact that people with a learning disability who could do paid work are indeed very anxious to do it.
        Again, my plea to the Minister is to provide disability campaigners with the reassurance that the public sector duty will make it clear to employers that "all" really must mean all disabled people, and that the codes of practice will reflect this. It is absolutely vital that parity in employment levels is established between disability groups, and it is absolutely vital that all disabled people who want a job and can do a job should have a job.
        I conclude my comments now by saying that I do not want your Lordships or the Minister to be left with the feeling that I have become an old and cynical curmudgeon; I really have not. I remain optimistic that this Bill has the potential dramatically to transform the lives of disabled people, and that this time the 1.5 million people with a learning disability will not be left behind again as the disability rights train vanishes into the distance.
        There is an old German proverb: "it is a bad bridge which is shorter than the stream is wide". For what seems like an eternity, people with disabilities have been faced with such a bridge. Successive governments have endeavoured to complete the construction work,

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        and this Bill makes yet another attempt. We must all help the engineers to finish the job on time and with an adequate budget to make it all possible.
        4.28 p.m.
        Baroness Murphy: My Lords, I shall be brief, not least because my carefully crafted notes were left in the taxi on the way here, which does not half concentrate the mind on the key points.
        I welcome the Bill, as have others, and wish it a speedy passage. I should like to draw attention to two issues, both relating to the disability of mental health disorders. The first has been tackled by other speakers, and the report of the scrutiny committee, under the chairmanship of the noble Lord, Lord Carter, also wrestled with it. It relates to the description in Schedule 1 of incapacities with regard to the activities of daily living. This Bill, like many others that come before the House relating to health issues, is almost solely framed around physical disabilities, with mental health issues thrown in as an afterthought.
        I am afraid that I am going to sound like one of those CDs which is stuck in a rut because of a scratch. However, I turn to the issue of the definition of mental incapacity, which will be raised in several forthcoming Bills.
        The human brain is not simply so many gigabytes of computing power, and intellectual competence is only one influence on the activities of daily life. Perceptions, emotions, disordered motivation, and inability to tackle things because of a lack of will are equally important. Drive and disturbance of drive simply do not figure in the list. Humane tribunals address those issues by incorporating disabilities under headings, but that simply will not do any more. Other countries can get it right, and we should, too.
        The second point is about the qualifying issues of mental health, which were alluded to in the scrutiny committee's report. I want to describe a very common situation where an individual has a severe mental health problem, such as a hypomania or depression that lasts for three to four months. That often requires hospitalisation but, within that time, the person is often fit to return to work. We know many cases where those individuals are excluded from taking full part in employment when they have employment, or lose employment because of stigma attached to people's expectations of their capacity, not because of the reality.
        Such people, currently and in the future if the Bill remains as it is, will have no course of action in redress. It is a great missed opportunity not to address that, particularly in the light of the fact that the Bill has recognised that stigma attached to MS, cancers and HIV/AIDS can be taken into account without impact on the activities of daily life. If that is so for them, surely it should be so for the commoner and often more disabling mental health problems.
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        I apologise to the House; I may have to leave before the closing speeches. However, I wanted to mention those issues in relation to mental health. I look forward very much to staying with the passage of the Bill and hope that those issues can be addressed.
        4.32 p.m.
        Baroness Masham of Ilton: My Lords, I welcome the Bill, as lately so much has been spoken of the right to die. Jane Campbell is a commissioner for the Disability Rights Commission and is severely disabled. She thinks that society's view is that death is preferable for severely disabled people such as herself, saying:
        "I am more concerned that everyone has the right to live".
        Many disabled people fear being admitted to hospital because they may not be resuscitated or may be left to die without being given food and fluids.
        In the shadows of Shipman, it is understandable that severely disabled people fear that they may be discriminated against in hospital or at the surgery, as there is so much pressure on the National Health Service. A new duty on public authorities requiring them, when exercising their functions, to have due regard to the need to eliminate unlawful discrimination against and harassment of disabled persons, and to promote equality of opportunity between disabled persons and others, is most welcome.
        Legislation is often conflicting. Severely disabled people going into hospital for diagnoses often encounter very difficult problems. Hospital staff may say that they cannot lift patients on to X-ray tables or examination plinths. If they cannot lift them, suitable equipment should be provided to overcome those problems. It is possible to have equipment that moves up and down to a convenient height, to enable patients to move across if they use a wheelchair. If the plinths or X-ray tables do not move—some do not—hoists should be provided.
        I am president of the Spinal Injuries Association. Recently our chief executive, who is a paraplegic, was taken to Southampton's A&E department when he developed autonomic dysreflexia—dangerously high blood pressure. He had to wait one and a half hours before being able to get off the trolley, because an ambulance crew had to finish a shift before they got him off. One hears of many such cases, which cause distress and are quite unnecessary if thought and planning goes into providing disabled people with what they need.
        Recently my husband, who is very ill, had to go to the A&E department for a procedure, and I telephoned in advance to advise the staff that he would need a hoist. They said that they had one. When he arrived, the battery was flat and it did not work. No one had bothered to check. Disabled people find that sort of thing time and again. I can see problems arising in trying to distinguish discrimination from inefficiency. If the legislation makes people sit up, consider the needs and plan accordingly, it will have served a useful purpose.
        I am pleased that HIV/AIDS, cancer and MS are included in the legislation. That makes me query a problem of double incontinence on which I would like an

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        answer in due course, if possible, from the Department of Health. Primary care trusts supply incontinence pads and paper sheets—inco-sheets—which are vital for those who need them. When talking to the firm that supplies them for my PCT, I was told that only the people who had previously got them would have them, not newly disabled people or those who had deteriorated. That seems ridiculous. For someone with constant diarrhoea who may have HIV/AIDS and cryptosporidium, which causes diarrhoea, or someone who for any reason is doubly incontinent, paper sheets are invaluable. If PCTs would realise how costly pressure sores are to the NHS, they would supply those necessary aids on need. Pressure sores cost the NHS millions of pounds a year. That seems yet another form of discrimination within the NHS.
        I welcome genuine mental illness being included in this legislation, but there is a wasteful culture of sick notes being given out willy-nilly by GPs to people who say that they suffer from stress or depression. Doctors find that the easy way out is to give sick notes without proper diagnosis, and employers can do nothing about it. Is there any way to prevent that culture becoming exacerbated through the Bill?
        Will the Department for Transport's voluntary code for air travel and trains now become mandatory? The Spinal Injuries Association would be pleased to give case evidence of people who have had problems, so that better services were available. The handlers who help disabled people on and off aeroplanes have not recently been as good as they used to be. The moving and handling has often been better at foreign airports, with better trained personnel doing the job. With pressure of space on airlines, tall and big people can have serious leg problems. Will they be covered by this legislation? Perhaps they will be only if they have a disability.
        On the diesel trains of GNER it is impossible to put a wheelchair into the wheelchair space in a first-class compartment, as the seat sticks out and makes the entrance too narrow. Will improvements be made to that? It seems ridiculous to have a space which cannot be used.
        Some of the out of London taxi firms are not willing to invest in their fleets until there are more details. There do not seem to be any overall standards. More training and training videos should be available for all manner of people who provide much-needed transport for disabled people.
        I am pleased that private clubs are included in the legislation. I hope that clubs such as Whites and Brooks in London will rectify their lifts, which are far too small to accommodate disabled people in wheelchairs.
        There are now several Acts of Parliament that involve disability and the legislation has become fragmented. Have the Government any plans to consolidate it? It would be helpful for those people who have to administrate the legislation. That part of the DDA which came into force in October has already made a difference. Our local bank in Masham has built
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        a ramp which has provided accessibility for the first time for people using wheelchairs. That happened just before 1 October, when I visited the bank for the first time. Therefore, legislation does make a difference and I hope that this legislation will, too.
        4.41 p.m.
        The Earl of Listowel: My Lords, I warmly welcome the Bill. I hesitate to take part in this disability legislation, given the immense depth of experience of many noble Lords who are taking part in the debate. I do so because of my particular interest in children in local authority care and the difference that the Bill could make for their lives. I also thank the Royal College of Psychiatrists and the Children's Society for helpful briefings in preparation for this debate.
        My concerns are threefold: that psychiatric disorders are fully recognised in the Bill, an issue to which the noble Lord, Lord Carter, drew attention; that specific duties are put on schools to ensure that disability discrimination is tackled; and that the duration of mental disorders, such as depression, will be recognised adequately in the Bill.
        Perhaps I may give an example of what happens in the care system. Some 60 per cent of the 60,000 children and young people in local authority care in this country have arrived due to previous abuse. A further 10 per cent have arrived in care due to family breakdown. Not surprisingly, the level of mental disorder among that group is 40 per cent for those in foster care, and 68 per cent of the 6,000 children in residential care have mental disorders as a result of their previous experiences.
        Schools exclude 10 to 12 times more looked-after children than other children. So it is important to ensure that specific duties are placed on schools to ensure that those children's disabilities are also recognised. There is already good guidance from Her Majesty's Government on how to cater for the needs of those children through designated teachers and personal education plans. But the Social Exclusion Unit's report into the education of these children highlighted the fact that such important tools are not consistently implemented. The Bill could be a useful lever to ensure that there is more focus on the training of teachers so that such disabilities are recognised and that the mechanisms are fully implemented.
        Last week, I attended a conference on the education of looked-after children. There was a presentation by a 24 year-old member of A National Voice, which is staffed by and speaks out for care leavers. He recounted his experiences in education. He left school with no qualifications, apart from a low level one. He said that he had been depressed and spent too much of his time in bed in his children's home, unable to find the will—my noble friend Lady Murphy alluded to this point—to go out of the home and into education. More might well have been done to help his disability of depression, when he was out of those bouts of depression, by ensuring that he obtained some educational experience. Many have the same experience and, regrettably, leave without any education or with few educational attainments.

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        Therefore, they are likely to be unemployed and are vastly over-represented in the criminal justice system, because their emotional needs have not been met and they have not attained the educational qualifications they need to engage in the work market.
        I hope that we will look carefully at the proper definition of mental disorders. I hope that the Bill will mark a change in the culture, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis of Heigham, said in her opening speech, and that Clause 3, which addresses the wider policies of public authorities in such areas, can begin to make a difference.
        Your Lordships may have recently viewed the "Dispatches" programme on Channel 4, "Profiting from kids in care". It was deeply depressing. One of the journalists managed to obtain access to a children's home for children with Down's syndrome and other disabilities, without an ID check at the front door or a Criminal Records Bureau check before entering. The programme also concerned other children in local authority care and the childcare professional who was invited to comment on the issues raised said, at the end of the programme, that the least qualified, untrained staff were actually working in the front line with the most difficult and challenging children.
        I hope that there are things that can be done and the Government are doing much to improve matters in this area. But we are starting from a low base. In Scotland, the Scottish Institute for Residential Childcare provides excellent training and consultancy for children's homes. We do not have that facility in England. Perhaps we could move towards that. Almost uniformly on the Continent, staff working in such situations have qualifications—two to three years' professional education and training—to work in such environments. They work not only with children but with elderly people. The situation is similar for elderly people with dementia in residential homes, where unqualified and untrained staff work. Again, the possibility of greater recognition of what it means to have a psychiatric disorder, and the need for professional responses to that, which the Bill offers, is welcome.
        I hope that in her response the Minister will reassure the House that specific duties will be placed on schools to ensure that the outcomes that we wish for are arrived at and that she will also allude to the duration of mental disorders such as depression. I look forward to the Minister's response.
        4.49 p.m.
        Baroness Wilkins: My Lords, I am conscious that I am surrounded by noble Lords who are steeped in the history of this Bill. It is to them that the country owes a real debt of gratitude for promoting, over the past quarter of a century, 14 major efforts at legislation to protect Britain's disabled people from discrimination. In particular, my noble friends Lord Ashley of Stoke and Lord Morris of Manchester have never let this issue stray far from the Government's attention. I am only sorry that the noble Lord, Lord Morris, cannot be with us today.
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        Like all previous speakers, I greatly welcome the Bill. The Disability Rights Commission rightly said that it,
        "represents a major extension of civil rights for 10 million disabled people in the UK and the fulfilment of a key Government manifesto commitment to implement outstanding recommendations of the Disability Rights Task Force".
        The Minister in another place, Maria Eagle, has won great respect in the disability community for her commitment to the Bill and to the difficult issues that it tackles. She has championed the Bill so effectively that, amidst all the competing demands for legislation from other government departments, it has won pride of place in being the first Bill to come to your Lordships' House in the new parliamentary Session. This Government can be truly proud of their record in tackling discrimination against disabled people.
        The measure which I particularly welcome is the public sector duty in Clause 3, described by the DRC as the "centrepiece" of the Bill. It is obviously sensible to try to ensure that, when public bodies make decisions or develop or implement a new policy, they make consideration of the needs of disabled people an integral part of the policy-making or decision-making process. That is so much better than waiting for disabled people to suffer some harm and then expecting individuals to pursue the matter through the courts in order lo rectify the discrimination.
        Over the past year, I have been involved with a best value review of disability services in my borough, Hammersmith & Fulham. The review has laid bare almost a decade of good intentions and well thought through plans which have never come to fruition because the political imperative has moved on and interest has shifted. Considerable expenditure and months of hard work came to nothing because there was no duty on the local authority to promote disability equality. That has now changed with regard to race issues in the borough since the public sector duty formed part of the Race Relations Act. I believe that the inclusion of this duty for disability in Clause 3 will make a real difference to disabled people's lives. It could not be more welcome.
        I was honoured to be invited to join the Joint Committee on the draft Disability Discrimination Billl—a committee which had two major advantages. First, it had an excellent chairman in my noble friend Lord Carter, who brought to it the wealth of his personal and political experience of disability issues, together with his expertise in chairing the recent Joint Scrutiny Committee on the draft Mental Capacity Bill. Secondly, we had the benefit of two outstanding specialist advisers, Dr Jenny Morris and Barbara Cohen, whose clarity of thinking and freshness of approach were invaluable.
        As my noble friend Lord Carter said, the Government accepted a great number of the Joint Committee's recommendations. It was particularly pleasing that they agreed to remove the requirement for a mental illness to be "clinically well recognised" for it to fit the definition of disability.
        Obviously it is very disappointing that a number of the Joint Committee's recommendations were not accepted by the Government. I hope that we shall manage to convince my noble friend the Minister by our arguments

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        when amendments are brought forward at later stages of the Bill. In particular, those will cover the issues of the definition of disability for people with mental health problems and the right of tenants to make reasonable adaptations to the physical features of their homes. I shall come back to those in a moment.
        I, too, want to draw attention to one early recommendation made by the Joint Committee, and I am delighted by the support that it has already received in this debate. I refer to Recommendation 9, which resulted from our discussions around the social model of disability. The recommendation is not as forceful as the disability movement might have wished but, in effect, it says that the Disability Rights Commission should consult and make recommendations to the Government on developing a social model definition of disability for the DDA, focusing on challenging discrimination on grounds of impairment and removing disabling barriers.
        I believe that that represents a major step in the recognition of the concept which has driven the disability movement since the early 1970s. The realisation that it is not our impairment that limits our opportunities and life chances but the way that society reacts to that impairment was a concept which liberated disabled people and formed the basis of the disability movement. It was that understanding which provided the groundswell demanding anti-discrimination legislation to which so many in the Chamber today listened and gave effect.
        It was 29 years ago this month that Vic Finkelstein first publicised on television the concept of the social model with his story of a disabled village. For a public accustomed to stories of plucky cripples facing the tragedy of their lives, it was not what they were expecting. He described a village designed for wheelchair users which "disabled" everyone else with its low ceilings and its institutional discrimination against those who walked. It forms part of my private litany of proud moments that this appeared on the first recording of the "Link" television programme, and I declare an interest as its first presenter.
        Vic Finkelstein was a South African disabled activist, recently exiled by the apartheid regime, who had recognised the connections between the segregated treatment of black people and the treatment of disabled people. In truth, in the early days there was considerable resistance to this new concept—we were so entrenched in the medical model. It takes considerable time for society to alter its fundamental concepts and it takes even longer for those concepts to be enshrined in legislation. That is why the Joint Committee's recommendation is so significant. The Disability Rights Commission has said that it intends to honour this recommendation "long term'', and we must not let its huge workload before the establishment of the single equality commission eclipse that commitment.
        It is because the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 is based on the medical model of disability that clearly disabled people are caused many difficulties in meeting the definition of "disability" under the Act. In particular, mental health service users have faced the biggest hurdles
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        in claiming their rights under the DDA because the definition of disability inadequately captures the challenges that they face.
        I welcome Clause 17, which removes the need for a mental impairment to be "medically well recognised". However, I want to give my noble friend the Minister notice that amendments will be brought forward in Committee to end the remaining bias towards physical impairments, as she has already heard today. In particular, the list of day-to-day capacities causes major problems, and the requirement for a mental impairment to have a substantial, adverse and longterm effect often excludes cases of depression where typically the effect is severe but short term.
        The other area that we shall want to pursue is the right for disabled tenants and leaseholders not to be unreasonably refused consent to make vital physical adaptations to their homes to enable them to get through the front door and move around safely. This is an urgent matter. The Survey of English Housing 2001–02 showed that 18,000 disabled people were living in unsuitable accommodation because the landlord refused to let them make the necessary modifications. It is an issue which my noble friend Lady Darcy and I pursued during the passage of the recent Housing Act, and the Government recognised that there was a gap in the law for which a solution must be found.
        While we obviously have a considerable amount to debate in the weeks ahead, I trust that the Bill will find its way swiftly on to the statute book. It is urgently needed to rectify some of the most obvious and disabling problems relating to the DDA. It is also vital that there is sufficient time for these new measures to bed down and become accepted before the Disability Rights Commission becomes incorporated into the promised Commission for Equality and Human Rights. I wish it good speed.
        4.58 p.m.
        Baroness Darcy de Knayth: My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, on her masterly exposition of a Bill which is very difficult to read but which is hugely welcomed by disabled people and disability organisations. As others have said, it will have a major impact on the life chances of disabled people. It closes many gaps in anti-discrimination law. I congratulate the Government and the Joint Committee on the draft Bill. As the noble Lord, Lord Oakeshott, said, it shows how valuable the scrutiny process is, particularly by a committee composed of people who really know their subject. I agree very much that it is important to get the Bill on to the statute book before the end of the Session.
        It has been a long journey, as my noble friend Lady Wilkins said, and there is still some way to go before complete anti-discrimination law is achieved. It was in 1979 that CORAD, the Committee on Restrictions Against Disabled People, was set up by the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Manchester, and chaired by Sir Peter Large. In 1982, it reported to the noble Lord, Lord Morris, who was then the first

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        Minister with responsibility for disabled people, on the need for anti-discrimination legislation. The noble Lord, Lord Morris of Manchester, truly is one of the grandfathers of this Bill and of the 1995 Act. As the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, said, the Government brought in the 1999 Act and other pieces of legislation, which have further improved anti-discrimination law. I too am sorry that the noble Lord, Lord Morris, is not in his place. He sends his apologies.
        I emphasise that the Bill is hugely welcomed by all disabled people. I shall pick a few areas on which to comment and on which we think we may need to bring forward amendments. As the twelfth speaker, I have done a certain amount of amending and slashing of my speech, so I hope that it makes sense.
        Clause 1 contains the very important provisions that make it unlawful for listed, locally electable authorities to discriminate against their members in the carrying out of official business. That is welcome. Like the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, I too regret that the new provisions do not apply, for example, to the election or appointment of officers to an authority and appointments to any other body to which an authority has the power to nominate, such as a police authority.
        Sir Peter Large points out that those are exactly the areas where unfair discrimination is likely to occur. I hope that the Minister will say why such areas are excluded and whether she will reconsider the point. One of the most significant improvements that the Bill would bring about is extending the prohibition of discrimination by public authorities to cover virtually all public functions and services.
        Clause 2, together with, as my noble friend Lady Wilkins said, the hugely important Clause 3— the public sector duty to promote disability equality—is a major step forward and should make a huge difference to disabled people's lives. Can the Minister confirm that those clauses will deal with the problems, for example, of huge pedestrianised schemes where there is no parking near enough for disabled people? Will they also cover footpaths, towpaths and bridges? The noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, will remember only too well the copious correspondence between herself, me and the Minister responsible for disabled people about footbridges over rivers. I see the Minister nodding. I would very much welcome that.
        That issue seemed to be a grey area. The question was whether highway authorities were acting as service providers in maintaining and ensuring access to footpaths and bridges, or whether that was a part of their regulatory functions and, therefore, not covered by Part 3 of the DDA. Can the Minister assure the House that this Bill will put an end to the uncertainty once and for all? I would welcome her saying something about that in her summing up. If there is uncertainty, please will she consider adding a clause to make the position absolutely clear?
        Of particular interest to me is the position of schools, to which the noble Lord, Lord Ashley of Stoke, referred specifically. The point is whether schools will be covered by the duty to promote disabled equality, not merely the general duty. I support that for the reasons given by the
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        noble Lord, Lord Ashley, which relate to the impact on children with special educational needs and their education. I hope that the Minister can confirm that schools are covered by the specific duties; otherwise we may have to pursue the matter.
        I have a different point on Clause 2. I shall go into detail on this as no one else has mentioned it. The matter hangs on one word, but I believe that I should alert the House to the point so that it can be considered in Committee in case anyone else is worried about it. Clause 2(5), page 6, line 7, declares that discriminatory,
        "Treatment, or a failure to comply with a duty, is justified … if the acts of the public authority which give rise to the treatment or failure are a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim".
        When he gave evidence to the Joint Committee, Sir Peter Large thought that that proviso might nullify many of the objectives or emasculate the effectiveness of Clause 2. He tells me that, notwithstanding the Government's reassurance, he still believes that. As he sees it, the problem is the word "proportionate", which involves a subjective assessment of the degree of injury between those helped by the legitimate aim and those discriminated against. It requires both an estimate of the numbers helped and the numbers likely to be affected by the legitimate aim of the authority—perfectly legitimate—and a subjective assessment of how far some had benefited from the authority's action and how much harm it had caused others.
        Disabled people are in double jeopardy in all such assessments. They are always likely to be in a minority. The actual harm done to disabled people is seldom fully recognised. I shall give an example of what I am talking about. How proportionate would a pedestrianisation of a shopping centre be if it meant improvements for 500 fit pedestrians but forced 50 disabled people to shop elsewhere? Would that be proportionate? Would that be legitimate? We need to think about that.
        Clause 9, on transport, is most welcome, but I join with others in saying that it should all happen earlier. I also welcome at long last the fact that it will be possible for the police, traffic wardens and particularly attendants to check blue parking badges and question those displaying them. I cannot help thinking that, if identity cards are issued, it will not be 34 years before they can be inspected by t he police.
        On housing, the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, has already given notice that we shall pursue amendments, particularly on the important omission from the Bill of provisions preventing private landlords and management companies from unreasonably refusing consent to disabled people to adapt their homes and the knotty question of communal areas. I am interested to see that the Law Society briefing that arrived today said that it believed that in practice the Landlord and Tenant Act 1927, which is what the Government believe protects the situation, actually favours landlords. We shall have to pursue that in Committee.
        Clause 15 is extremely welcome. It will cover bodies which award general qualifications such as GCSEs and A-levels. As the Minister said, that is something very close to my heart and of concern to Skill, the

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        National Bureau for Students with Disabilities, of which I am president. That is very good. RADAR says that there are some examining and standard-setting bodies that are not covered by the public sector duty. We may have to look into that.
        I return to where I started. The Bill is hugely welcomed by many disabled people and it is very important to bring such improvements to the 1995 and 1999 Acts as soon as possible, not least because, as the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, said, many disabled people are seriously worried that the fight to end discrimination against them will—or may—be relaxed when the proposed Commission for Equality and Human Rights is established and that the currently proposed safeguards are unlikely to succeed.
        Therefore, they believe that it is essential that as much time as possible is given to allow the Bill's important additional protections for disabled people to bed in and to permeate the public consciousness so that their special needs are not forgotten in favour of the more popular and readily understood endeavours of improving community relations, equality and human rights. I hope I do not misquote her, but I believe the Minister said that she also saw the importance of the Bill being bedded in carefully before the matter was subsumed. I wish the Bill a safe and speedy passage, enhanced, I hope, with some amendments.
        5.10 p.m.
        Lord Addington: My Lords, we have reached the point in the Bill where everything has been said but not everybody has said it. So I shall try to be as brief as possible in adding to the discussion. First, I would like to thank the Minister for acknowledging the role of the whole of Parliament and all the people around this House in getting where we are today.
        I have always felt that disability legislation is a little like a snowball; it needs the odd push but as it gets bigger and we go through the process changes will come. The first steps are always the most difficult in any journey. It is said here that every time we have taken the matter on a little further we have been able to do more. Also I believe that Whitehall and the Government have learnt that there are no limitations to the matter. The read-across for any form of legislation which deals with a basic human/civil right will affect everything else.
        The most welcome part of the Bill must be Clauses 2 and 3. There we take a step on from the welcome—as it was—1995 Act. People will now be proactive. The first step forward is that we will not have to put things right in the courts. I congratulate the Minister on being the one to bring this major concept to the Floor of House. We can all gather behind the provision. However, if we are now promoting good relations I cannot help but feel that the role would be easier if we cut across society and made sure that we had access to the whole of it. We should stop looking at departmentalising disability legislation and deal with the whole of society.
        As a member of the committee that looked at the draft Bill, the eyes of the noble Lord, Lord Carter, glazed over at certain points. He said, "Well, you don't
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        realise that it goes to all other parts of society when people are bringing forward legislation". Most of the people dealing with that Bill did because we knew about it from different experiences. Moving slightly away from naming every single disability group and trying to bring things together as one section is a step forward.
        As the noble Lord, Lord Rix, was speaking, it occurred to me that many of the things he was saying applied also to many other groups. Autism is a group that did not get its head above the parapet in many of the discussions on the Bill. I am not absolutely sure why it did not, but we can put that right. Many considerations in autism are common to the other groupings here—for instance, problems with communication. When such issues are brought into consideration, one realises why people get worried about getting definitions right.
        To jump around the Bill, I believe that Clause 17, dealing with the difficulty in communication, will plug an important gap. It is very easy for an articulate person with a disability to present himself, especially under the new climate, and being able to communicate and to make people aware of problems surrounding his rights. In this House we tend to see people who, either by ability or by luck, have managed to deal with their disability or at least to cope with it in a certain way which allows them to push themselves forwards. Most people, especially those on the edge, are able to play a full part in society with a little help and not be excluded. That is where your Lordships must focus your attention. We must allow people to pop over that edge and the help provided in this Bill will enable them to do that. It will tie them in with the rest of the Government's legislation. The reason the Government give assistance in other areas is to enable people to play a full part in society. That helps with, for instance, tax and revenue to enable them to do other things. If we draw all that together this legislation starts to make much more sense. However, there are problems within the Bill. We must draw attention to the provisions which do not allow those people to go a little further.
        To go back to Clause 3, I would ask the Government to make sure that schools are covered in the Bill. Many of the major steps on disability taken in this House have been in relation to schools. Good qualifications will make it easier for the disabled to work. We should make sure that schools are tied into Clause 3. If the noble Baroness can give us an assurance and tell us how it will be done, either now or at some time in the future, she will see me quite happily throwing away the amendments that are undoubtedly being prepared. To do that will be a major step.
        I turn to the rights of tenants. On the draft Bill committee we were told that the 1927 Landlord and Tenant Act covered the issue, but everybody said that it did not. We have not moved any further. If you are a tenant you should have the right to make some reasonable adjustments. There might be the caveat that one must make good, say, the decorative quality of the building after one has finished with it. Perhaps we can explore that line of compromise. But, we must

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        include a provision that removes the barrier. We must be allowed to do that within the framework of a reasonable provision.
        Transport has been covered by many noble Lords. As my noble friend said, there is a balancing act between the whole of society and those who are disabled and I believe that the Government are taking steps in the right direction. However, I remember the long discussions we had on 2020 as opposed to 2017 for compliance. We asked the Government: "Is there any reason why you cannot do it?". We were told that, for example, it was inconvenient, it cost a bit more or you have to bring forward schedules of work.
        I believe that one of the reasons why 2020 may well have been put to the Government as an acceptable date was because the 2005 enactment date requires 15 years for refurbishment. That is probably the reason for it. We could speed it up by those three years. There is the physical capacity within the rail industry. There will be opportunity costs, but that is the sort of question we must look at long and hard in the course of the Bill. Where do we draw the line?
        However, having done that I believe that compliance certificates give a more realistic way of enforcing what is expected of the rail industry. It is a good idea. This should be dealt with in a non-criminal way with fines being imposed. That is probably a sensible way forward on agreed matters.
        The Bill, as it stands, is a good thing. It could be a lot better if we just go—it is not even a mile, it is a few inches—a little further and make sure that we are more ahead of the game or at least keeping up with current thinking. If we do, other things will come from it. The central air quality commission will have an easier job. Other legislation will not have to take account of many of the things to do with disability; we will stop having to include disability issues, as we have done, in housing Bills and so on; and we will be able to carry on and take the provision as read.
        The one ambition that I have ever really had is that the disability lobby can say that it is no longer campaigning. We are monitoring the Government's existing legislation to see whether it will be comprehensive enough to say that that is where we have got to. We can take a step towards that and we can go further, but I am afraid that we are not there yet.
        5.18 p.m.
        Lord Higgins: My Lords, whenever one looks at the list of those who have put down their names to speak in debates on Second Reading in your Lordships' House, it is interesting to contemplate to what extent the message has gone out, "Round up the usual suspects". Certainly as far as concerns today's speakers, the usual suspects have all turned up—with the exception, alas, of the noble Lord, Lord Morris, whom we certainly miss from our debate today. In fact, the list is rather more than that; it is almost a roll of honour of those who are not simply expert in the field but who have given up large parts of their lives to fight the cause of the disabled. Therefore, it is with very considerable diffidence that one comes to the Dispatch Box today to wind up this particular debate.
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        It is a good thing that the debate is starting in the House of Lords after our experience on the Pensions Bill, which arrived from the Commons in a hopelessly under-debated state. If we can send it back to the Commons when we have examined it in considerable detail, that will be a good thing. I want to say a word about timing. It is almost exactly a year ago that the question first arose of why it was a draft Bill, rather than a Bill, that was proposed specifically for approval by your Lordships' House in the first instance.
        I was concerned to notice that Mr Peter Hain said in another place:
        "we discovered that the Opposition in the House of Lords is trying to block its early progress".—[Official Report, Commons 21/10/ 04; col. 1031.]
        That was a disgraceful statement. Nothing could be further from the truth. Only four days later, the noble Baroness paid tribute to how we were co-operating in getting the Bill through. It is important to put that firmly on the record.
        Having said that, when I spoke a year or so ago when the noble Baroness the Leader of the House proposed a Joint Committee to consider the Bill, I expressed concern that that would delay it unnecessarily—or delay it, at any rate. That has turned out to be the case, but, having said that, I entirely withdraw what I said about the utility of our having considered it because, under the noble Lord, Lord Carter, the proposals have undergone considerable detailed scrutiny and we are in a much better position to deal with the Bill in Grand Committee, I understand, and later stages than we would otherwise have been.
        In effect, the noble Lord's committee has provided us with an agenda and enabled us to focus—a terrible "in" word—on the key issues for consideration. There are about 75 recommendations from the Joint Committee; the Government have rejected or, at any rate, expressed doubts about some 28 of them. So we can now balance the arguments, some of which are finely balanced, between the views expressed by the Government and the Select Committee.
        At this point. I ask one question. On the recommendations with which the Government agreed, will the Government be tabling amendments or will it be left to Members of the Committee and the Opposition? It would be helpful to know how we will handle that aspect of the matter.
        One reason why I said a year ago that there was no reason why we should not go ahead was that the matter had, even then, been discussed for about seven years, including by the Disability Rights Task Force, and so on. A great many aspects of the matter had been cleared in advance. There are obviously further points that we will need to consider, but the other essential reason why I thought that we could proceed with speed is that there is always a balance to be hit on such issues between the problem of those who are suffering from discrimination because of disability and, on the other side, the cost that may be imposed on private industry, and so on. It is fascinating that virtually the only representation received other than support for the Bill from the Confederation of British Industry, has concerned how one should define disability by clinical

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        examination and so on. Generally speaking, there is now agreement that we can proceed, having balanced those two aspects.
        I turn to particular amendments. Some are comparatively easy to deal with, such as the extent to which one can consolidate the legislation—it is certainly spread all over the place at present—and to what extent we should change the title of the Bill, and so on. Has the Scottish Parliament now confirmed that it is content that the Bill should cover Scotland as well as England and Wales?
        As I said, a great many of the list of recommendations and the Government's response to them are agreed all round, including by us. I do not think that there are any on which the Government and the committee have agreed where we especially want to disagree. That is perhaps important in proceeding with the legislation as quickly as possible.
        As for the specific proposals, there has been extensive debate and particular attention has focused on the issue of transport and all the problems that that involves, not least the time limit for railways, where substantial costs are obviously involved in carrying out any necessary modifications. The question of whether it is 2020 or 2017 is no doubt something that we can examine in Committee. There are other issues. The noble Lords, Lord Oakeshott, Lord Rix and Lord Ashley, all dealt with transport problems. An interesting point was made about audiovisual equipment on trains, which I take to mean Underground trains, which are rather good in that respect, as well as surface trains. The noble Baroness, Lady Masham, raised the problem of airlines, which is not considered in detail at present. There are the problems with transport staff, buses and so on. We will need to consider all of those in considerable detail.
        The other main area in which there is a lot of concern is how we should treat various health conditions. In particular, having extended the proposals to HIV, MS and cancer, the extent to which one should take steps at least to give the government power to exclude certain forms of cancer is a matter on which there is disagreement between the Government and the Joint Committee. We will need to consider the whole matter of progressive illnesses and particular problems concerning depression. The noble Baroness, Lady Murphy, who has considerable expertise in the field, expressed concern on those issues and the difficult question of whether it should be a two-year period or the fact that a depression lasts for six months in a two-year period. Again, we will have to consider whether amendments are necessary to address those particular problems. So there is a whole range of health issues.
        In a sense, the housing issues are simpler. The noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, the noble Lord, Lord Ashley, and, in particular, the noble Lord, Lord Rix, expressed concern about the common parts of the accommodation that might be modified and the housing issue more generally. The noble Lord, Lord Rix, also dealt with the crucial issue of what he described as hate crime and the question of to what extent the Government can promote better relations proactively rather than passively between the disabled community and others.
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        Those are all very important issues, but I stress once again that I hope that we can make rapid progress on all of them. An interesting point is that, apart from the question of transport, where considerable cost may be involved, the regulatory impact assessment suggests that the cost involved is really quite trivial. It must be seen against the background of the number of people affected. The figure given normally is 10 million adults and, strangely, 0.7 million children—although I am not sure what is the basis for that figure. That is important and we need to consider it in some detail.
        All these measures build on the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, which, as my noble friend Lord Skelmersdale pointed out, was put forward by Mr William Hague when he was in the Department of Social Security. It is very important that we do all that we can to proceed on these matters as rapidly as possible—subject, of course, to noble Lords' careful consideration of the issues, particularly where there is disagreement between the Committee and the Government. I am sure that those points can be resolved. If we can do it quickly, it will be greatly to the advantage not only of disabled people but of the whole community.
        5.30 p.m.
        Baroness Hollis of Heigham: My Lords, I am very grateful for the welcome given to the Bill after the pre-legislative scrutiny, although I must say that I was arrogant enough to assume that it would happen. I have been well warned and am now thoroughly terrified by all the proposals for amendments that will be forthcoming. But I take some comfort from the assertions of the noble Lord, Lord Higgins, that where the Government and the Committee agree, the Tories will not seek to sow dissension.
        Many of us have personal biographies of disability; others do not. Like the noble Lord, Lord Oakeshott, I, too, spent a few months in a wheelchair in the late 1970s. The high spot was going to Transport House, as it was then, where the top two floors were inaccessible by lift. When everyone came there for a meeting, the call would go out, "Kent miners, Kent miners!" and men as broad as they were tall would carry the wheelchair up the last two flights. The low spot was getting the wheelchair covered in dog shit and therefore on one's clothing. I do not know how people can bear that day in day out; it is almost like moral pollution as well as physical pollution. If only dog owners knew what problems they presented to people in wheelchairs they might show greater consideration.
        I shall deal first with the routine business of how we might handle the Bill. The noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, asked about a keeling schedule. I hope to produce an informal keeling schedule before Committee to enable a clear read-across. He asked about implementation timetables. I have details of when we expect to implement the main provisions of the Disability Discrimination Bill. Rather than read them out, I shall circulate them to all noble Lords who have taken part in today's debate.
        Similarly, there is an array of different regulatory powers involving my department, the Department for Transport and the Department for Education and

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        Skills. We are producing a consultative document based on Delivering equality for disabled people. I hope that our consultation document, which describes the regulations that we propose, will be published by the end of the year, but I attach the health warning that that may not be possible. Again, I shall ensure that as soon as it is publicly available it will go to all Committee members.
        The transport regulations have already been announced by my noble friend Lord Davies, who, I hope, will handle those amendments in Committee. Ministers from the Department for Education and Skills will consult on the draft regulations on the power in Clause 15—what is a relevant qualification and the method of enforcement—in spring 2005. I hope that that deals with some of the handling points.
        My noble friend Lord Carter asked about the interconnection with the other Bills. I think that he was asking for clarification in the Bill, as I am sure that he knows better than anyone in the House what the interaction will be. We have three different Bills for three different purposes, each with its own methods of seeking redress should it be necessary. In addition to this Bill on disability rights, there is the draft Mental Health Bill, which will provide a framework for the compulsory treatment of a few people, and the Mental Capacity Bill, which would empower people to make decisions where they can in clarifying the law where they cannot. We do not believe that there are issues about the way in which the three Bills interact that might need to be resolved, but obviously we will keep that under review.
        The noble Lord, Lord Higgins, asked when the pre-legislative scrutiny recommendations would come into the Bill. All the recommendations that the Government accepted from pre-legislative scrutiny are now in the Bill. Further adjustments should not be necessary unless during discussion we feel that clarification is necessary.
        As for Scotland, there has not yet been a Sewel Motion on Clause 3. If and when there is one, I shall report to noble Lords. I have no reason to think that there will be a difficulty.
        I shall now seek to address as many of the issues raised as possible. Noble Lords will understand, however, that I would need an hour or two to go through most of them thoroughly, so, if it is accepted, I shall respond in writing to the points that I cannot deal with in person.
        The first big issue, which was raised by my noble friend Lord Carter and addressed very eloquently by my noble friend Lady Wilkins, was about the medical model and the social model. My noble friend's phrase that it was very wise to be pragmatic in this regard caught my sentiments exactly. There is no tidy read-across between the degree of impairment and the degree of disability or discrimination that someone may suffer as a result of that impairment. One moves from a medical model through to a social one as a result.
        I shall give a very obvious example. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Salisbury, who apologised for having to leave, was concerned about
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        the isolation of those who are profoundly deaf; none the less, nearly 70 per cent are in employment. Yet barely 10 per cent or 12 per cent of people with a mental health problem which may in clinical terms be regarded as relatively mild—that is not meant to be a subjective comment but a description—will be able to enter employment. The difference between those two suggests a movement across from a medical model to a social one.
        Several noble Lords asked why the Bill did not include a phrase to promote good relations. My noble friend produced a form of words about social inclusion which I found rather attractive. I re-echo the words of my honourable friend in the other place, the Minister for Disabled People, Maria Eagle: we are open to be persuaded about that if there is good evidence; but alternative wording may be preferable. In my view there is not an obvious read-across to, say, race relations because we are not, for the most part. talking about disabled people living as geographical communities, unlike ethnic minorities, where there are issues of integration and cultural separation.
        We are also worried that public authorities might think that they should not take positive steps, such as disabled parking schemes, because non-disabled people are envious of them. Therefore, good relations are about equity between different ethnic community groups. The same may not apply where we may absolutely want and need—rightly so—affirmative action for disabled people to get an outcome such as equality of access. That is why there is not necessarily a tidy read-across, but we are not closed to the issue. It is not simply awkwardness or cussedness on the part of the Government; there are real problems about definition.
        I shall try broadly to respond to the specific points raised according to clause order, although I am sure that I have got them out of order. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Salisbury asked whether prisons, as well as the police, were included in Clauses 2 and 3. We accepted the pre-legislative scrutiny recommendations not to exempt prisons from Clause 2 and the Prison Service from Clause 3.
        The noble Baroness, Lady Darcy de Knayth, asked whether councillors and their election and selection by political parties came under Clause 2. It is not appropriate to intervene in the rough and tumble of the political process of selecting and adopting candidates; it is for local constituency parties to decide. However, having served on councils with wheelchair users and others with severe disabilities, I have not seen any discrimination where candidates on other grounds, such as their commitment to the political party, their experience and so on, showed that they were appropriate candidates.
        The noble Lord, Lord Rix, related some horrifying stories in a very moving speech about some of the physical abuse to which people with learning disabilities could be exposed. Existing legislation in the form of the Public Order Act 1986 and the Protection from

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        Harassment Act 1997 already protects individuals from abuse or harassment. In addition, if a case has a disability discrimination element to it, a court can take it into consideration when sentencing. We believe that the legislation already offers the appropriate legal protection to disabled people, although I accept that we must transform the culture—people's attitudes—rather than, necessarily, the legal framework for responding to abuses.
        The noble Baroness, Lady Masham of Ilton, asked about suitable equipment in hospitals. The public sector duty will ensure that all public services have due regard to the way in which all their functions affect disabled people. They will have to plan better, more comprehensively and more thoughtfully. Services such as lifting patients are already covered in the Part III rights, but, as the noble Baroness said, it was the lack of a battery, rather than the lack of good intent, that was the problem. We are hoping that the Bill will put a "disability filter" on to people's perceptions of their everyday activities, so that they can ensure that there is no passive discrimination—if I can put it that way—through a failure to act in a obvious and appropriate way.
        The noble Baroness also asked about the right to die and about "do not resuscitate" issues. They are difficult issues, but treatment decisions are already covered by Section 19 of the DDA. The public sector duty in Clause 3 will prompt public sector university medical schools to give due regard to promoting equality as part of student training. It should not be an issue, but we must deal with the culture among some doctors. Like the noble Baroness, I read Jane Campbell's piece about having to fight for the right to be resuscitated and about her husband's role in ensuring that those rights were respected. I found it shocking and moving.
        Some difficult transport issues were raised. They are difficult because of the high capital costs in some cases, as the noble Lord, Lord Higgins, pointed out. I think that everyone recognised that transport might be one of the hardest barriers for disabled people to overcome in order to ensure full integration.
        The noble Lord, Lord Oakeshott of Seagrove Bay, raised a series of issues. I may need to come back to him in correspondence on some of them. He asked how many people would travel by train if they could, but do not. I think that that is the way in which he asked it. We have no sense of the latent demand for train travel, but we know that 70,000 people have a disabled person's railcard, which gives some indication. Many more enjoy the mobility component of the disability living allowance.
        The noble Lord, Lord Rix, rightly reminded us that it was not just a matter of wheelchair users and white stick users. There are perhaps 500,000 wheelchair users—one in 100 of us—and there are a million people with severe visual impairments—one in 50 of us. However, something like 1.5 million people—one in 30 of us—have learning difficulties, and their needs are different from questions of physical access on GNER trains and the like.
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        The noble Lord, Lord Oakeshott of Seagrove Bay, asked why it would cost twice as much to go for 2017 as for 2020, the proposed end date. That is simply because twice as many vehicles would be affected. I am sure that that issue will be explored in Committee.
        The noble Lord, Lord Higgins, asked about audiovisual passenger information systems on trains and asked whether Underground trains would be included. The answer is, "Yes". Rail vehicle accessibility regulations apply to underground systems as well as heavy rail, light rail and tram systems.
        The noble Baroness, Lady Masham of Ilton, asked about GNER trains. New vehicles have been covered for just those problems since January 1999, but I suspect that the particular vehicles mentioned were introduced before January 1999. When refurbishment comes up, a proportionate response should take care of the issue. I am afraid that that does help in the exasperating mean time.
        I will ensure that a copy of the Hansard record of our debate is sent to every organisation—clubs, railways and so on—that has been mentioned by name today. That might make them appreciate the concerns that have been expressed today.
        Rail passenger information systems should be more widely available. They will be. Rail vehicle accessibility regulations require that PISs are provided on all new rail vehicles that have entered service since 1 January 1999. Obviously, there is an issue of cost with regard to refurbishment only.
        The noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, asked when new rail provisions would obviate the need for exemptions. The new compliance certification process, which will be introduced by Clause 7, should obviate the need for exemptions, save for exceptional circumstances. New builds and refurbishments will be closely monitored and controlled from the outset, and all vehicles will require a compliance certificate before they can enter service.
        There are some other issues. We expect the transport code to be negative, rather than affirmative, but I understand that colleagues in the Department for Transport will next week discuss associated issues, including rail accessibility and so on, with officials of Mencap.
        The noble Lord, Lord Oakeshott of Seagrove Bay, spoke about how bus stops can be blocked by parked cars. We recognise that accessible vehicles are only part of the solution. Other provisions in the Bill relating to public functions should ensure that access to the highway is also addressed. That is the right way to deal with that.
        I was asked whether the code of practice for aviation would become mandatory. It cannot. Because they are international, aviation and shipping are subject to voluntary codes of practice, but we will monitor those codes of practice. We expect a report on compliance in the second half of 2005. If the voluntary approach proves ineffective, we will consult to see how much further we can go. However, it is an international issue, not just a domestic British issue, which we have to address.

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        Why are discriminatory adverts by service providers not also to be outlawed? The simple answer is that we have not found that to be a problem. If it is, we will come back to it.
        I was asked about clubs and lifts. Again, there is the question of whether the cost of adjustment is reasonable, whether the building is listed and whether the changes can be made in a listed building. I will repeat the names given by the noble Baroness: White's and Brooks's. During my time in a local authority, we were told that such things would not be possible in various listed buildings, including the Octagon Chapel, probably the finest Dissenting chapel—a Quaker chapel—of the 1720s, built by a fine architect whose name, I think, was John Goldsmith. We found ways of ensuring accessibility into very fine grade 1 listed buildings. That benefited not only disabled people but elderly people, people with children, people with shopping bags and the like. Some good work has been done in Liverpool, making sure that listed heritage buildings increase accessibility without in any sense deforming the building. We must continue to ensure that all architects are aware of the issue.
        I was pressed by noble Lords on the question of schools. Noble Lords may have overlooked the full situation for schools under the DDA. Schools are employers, service providers and educators. As such, they are already covered by Parts II, III and IV of the DDA. In particular, the Special Educational Needs and Disability Act 2001 covered pupils. I think that, perhaps, people do not fully realise how far schools already come within the legislation.
        I was asked about footpaths by the noble Baroness, Lady Darcy de Knayth. I guessed that she would do that. Basically, the overall effect of Clause 2 will be to ensure that the activities of the public sector, if they are functions, are covered by the DDA. That means that, if a highway authority has functions in respect of footpaths—such as providing and maintaining them—it will be covered by Part III of the DDA, as extended by this Bill. There may remain some narrow exceptions that we will, no doubt, explore in Committee, but the noble Baroness is right about the broad thrust.
        The noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, asked me about dwellings. The noble Lord, Lord Oakeshott of Seagrove Bay, asked about commercial property. I know that it is the point at which the Government do not share fully the views of the scrutiny committee or some members of it, but I must emphasise the fact that the Bill does not cover physical features internal to buildings. It covers issues such as a tenant's ability to read a tenancy agreement provided in the appropriate format and the need for portable aids and appliances, where appropriate.
        I have had some personal experience of the issue, when I was reinstating the house of my parents, both of whom were disabled, after they died. I took out the stair lift and replastered the hall walls; replastered the bathroom after taking out the bath hoist and grab rails; and I redecorated. The cost then was £3,000 or £4,000. Where a tenant agrees to do that, that is fine. But when a tenant dies, where does the cost of
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        reinstatement fall, given that 40 per cent of landlords own only one property? Therefore, as with an inherited property, there may not be a great commercial estate.
        There are quite difficult issues here regarding the costs of reinstatement and the degree to which existing legislation can be tested in court about unreasonableness. So it is a test about reasonableness which, no doubt, we can explore further. The same applies to commercial premises. Clause 13 does not require such changes so the RIA estimates are low precisely because they are only about formats, types and so on. Adjustment by employers with commercial premises is already covered under Part 2—reactive duties—and for customers under Part 3—anticipatory duties.
        Finally, I turn to definitions. Obviously, we will debate further issues about depression. I am sure that we will come back to that. Clearly, there has been a wide welcome to the Government departing from the term "clinically well recognised".
        I was asked by the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, about cancer. Certain cancers will be excluded from being covered by the DDA definition. We are consulting on basal skin cell cancer and squamous cell cancers. My understanding is that this is a one-off intervention. One is not therefore dealing with long periods of treatment possibly requiring chemotherapy, radiotherapy and so on, which would naturally need to be covered before it became fully symptomatic.
        Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, does the noble Baroness accept that the great thing about cancer is that it depends on how far developed it is before it is given a label? That is something that we shall have to probe in Committee.
        Baroness Hollis of Heigham: My Lords, absolutely. But there are other forms, such as the very early stages of cervical cancer, which can be treated by cone biopsy. We understand that something like 83,000 patients with various forms of this sort of cancer are treated each year. At this stage—the Committee may be able to persuade us otherwise—we do not think that they should necessarily come within the definition of continuing to be disabled after their treatment has been satisfactorily concluded.
        After all, the whole point about disability here is that it has a substantial and adverse effect for a sustained period of time on daily living activities, which may not be the case in some situations. Having said that, within the time guidelines, I hope that I have addressed as far as I can the issues raised by your Lordships today. I am sure that I have overlooked some, in which case I shall—
        Baroness Darcy de Knayth: My Lords, can the noble Baroness write to me about the importance of the small word "proportionate" in new Section 21D(5). under Clause 2? I suspect that its impact may be out of all proportion to the size of the subsection.
        Baroness Houk of Heigham: My Lords, the noble Baroness used the example of pedestrianisation and

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        whether cobbles could be used because of their visual effect. It would be very difficult for people with—to give obvious examples—wheelchairs and visual impairment. I am very happy to write to the noble Baroness.
        If the noble Baroness has examples of that, I would like to see them. Again, from my experience, wherever that was presented to me as the leader of a local authority in my ancient past, there was never any problem about finding some reconciliation of those issues. Clearly, if the noble Baroness has examples, we would like to address them. Otherwise, I suspect that it would be a matter if necessary for the appropriate judicial review, if it came to that.
        With those responses, I hope that your Lordships will agree that the Bill has now had its Second Reading. With your Lordships' agreement, I should like to move that the Bill be referred to a Grand Committee.
        On Question, Bill read a second time, and committed to a Grand Committee.

        Extradition to US
        5.54 p.m.
        Lord Goodhart Lord Goodhart rose to ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will reconsider the current legal provisions governing extradition to the United States.
        The noble Lord said: My Lords, this Question arises from a history of government mishandling, which may have grave consequences for a significant number of individuals. Perhaps I may explain the history of this. Until 1 January 2004, extradition from the United Kingdom to the USA and vice versa was governed by a treaty signed in 1972 and ratified in 1976. Under that treaty each country had to provide prima facie evidence of guilt before it could get an extradition order.
        On 31 March 2003, the Government signed a new extradition treaty with the USA, which contained powers that extended extradition to all crimes with a maximum sentence of 12 months or more instead of containing a list of extraditable crimes, as the previous treaty had done. It also simplified procedures on both sides for extradition. So far, so good.
        But for extradition from the USA to the United Kingdom, Article 8(3) requires the United Kingdom to produce,
        "such information as would provide a reasonable basis to believe that the person sought committed the offence for which extradition is requested".
        There is no corresponding obligation in the case of extradition from the United Kingdom to the USA. In effect, the United States has a right to extradition on demand. Therefore, the treaty in a very important respect is not reciprocal.
        No one outside the Government knew that the treaty was being negotiated. The public were first informed of it on the day of its signing by a written response from the Lord Chancellor to a planted
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        question. There was no chance whatever for any form of parliamentary scrutiny or comment, which I think proves the case for parliamentary scrutiny of treaties before they are signed.
        Meanwhile, an Extradition Bill was going through Parliament. It was introduced in the House of Commons on 14 November 2002. It received Royal Assent as the Extradition Act 2003 just over a year later on 20 November 2003. The Act was primarily required for the purpose of providing for the European arrest warrant for extradition between member states of the European Union.
        On a reciprocal basis, it provides for extradition from the United Kingdom to other European Union states and vice versa without prima facie evidence having to be produced. That, in fact, was no novelty. Under the Council of Europe Convention on Extradition, signed by the United Kingdom in 1990 and implemented in 1991, the need for prima facie evidence for extradition between member states of the Council of Europe who are parties to the convention is excluded. Of course, there are more than 40 member states of the Council of Europe, most of which have signed up to the convention. But that convention is fully reciprocal.
        Part 1 of the Extradition Act implements the European arrest warrant between European Union member states. Part 2 applies to other countries. Part 2 retains the need for evidence except in cases of extradition sought by a country that has been designated by an order made by the Home Secretary under Section 71(4) of the Act. The order requires the approval of both Houses by affirmative resolution.
        The Government then introduced an Order in Council entitled the Extradition Act 2003 (Designation of Part 2 Territories) Order 2003, which came into force on 1 January 2004; that is, on the same date as the Act. That order included the designation under Section 71(4) of a number of states which were not either members of the European Union or parties to the Council of Europe convention. In particular, it included Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa and the USA. In all of those states, except the USA, extradition is on a reciprocal basis.
        Although the treaty of 31 March 2003 is not yet in force because it has not been ratified by the USA, the effect of the designation under Section 71(4) was to implement the new treaty before it was necessary to do so and before any of the limited benefits provided to the United Kingdom under the treaty were available. Further, it has done so on what is in effect a retrospective basis. Although the commencement order provides that the new procedure shall not apply to extradition requests received on or before 31 December 2003, that restriction can be and has been circumvented by the USA withdrawing a request made before 31 December 2003 and making a new request for extradition in respect of the same offence after that date. That is clearly contrary to the spirit, if not to the letter, of the treaty.
        The designation order was debated in your Lordships' House on 16 December 2003. In that debate the noble Baroness, Lady Scotland, said:
        "The treaty has not been enforced yet because it has not been signed by the US Senate. We anticipate that the treaty will be put before the Senate formally early in the new year and approved shortly thereafter".—[Official Report 16/12/03; col. 1071.]
        We are now nearly a year further on and the treaty has still not been ratified by the Senate. Furthermore, I believe that there is significant opposition to it in the Senate and that it may well never be ratified. A campaign against ratification of the treaty has been spearheaded by the American Civil Liberties Union and by Irish-American organisations in particular, including the Ancient Order of Hibernians. Indeed, examples of campaign letters are posted on the websites. Since the USA already has in effect the benefit of this treaty, it is under no incentive whatsoever to ratify it.
        I believe that there are very good reasons why we should not agree to extradition to the USA without evidence. First, the standard of justice in the USA is very variable. There are 51 different jurisdictions, one for each state, together with the federal jurisdiction. Some of these jurisdictions are good, but some are bad, and indeed very bad.
        Secondly, there is inadequate legal aid for those who cannot afford a lawyer. In certain states judges must stand for re-election and have to campaign on the severity of their sentences. It is difficult to see how that is something which can be regarded as an impartial judiciary.
        Thirdly, in the USA there is excessive plea bargaining. That is practised here and it is right that there should be a reduced sentence for a guilty plea. But in many parts of the USA sentences are so long and the discounts for a guilty plea so enormous that there is a real incentive for the innocent to plead guilty. Problems also arise with bail, particularly in the case of non-residents. Bail has to be backed by a bail bond, but no US bail bond company is likely to issue a bail bond to a non-resident. The result is that non-residents have to spend long periods in prison before their trial.
        Fourthly, there is increasing use of extra-territorial criminal legislation by the USA, especially in fraud cases. This can result in extradition being sought by the USA where the alleged offence was committed in the UK, the alleged victim was in the UK, all or most of the relevant documents and witnesses are in the UK, and the defendants whose extradition is sought are resident in the UK. That comes from an actual case, not a purely hypothetical one. Such extradition can be forestalled by the United Kingdom authorities initiating proceedings themselves for the same offence. If someone is tried here and acquitted, he or she cannot be extradited because of the double jeopardy rule. Ironically, therefore, defendants are better off if they are tried and acquitted in the United Kingdom than if the Crown Prosecution Service decides that there is insufficient evidence against them to justify a prosecution.
        Article 7 of the Council of Europe Convention on Extradition permits the refusal of extradition where the offence is committed in the territory of the state from which the extradition is sought. Similar provisions should be applied in relation to the USA. Moreover, there is no reciprocity. We are told that the reason for the American refusal to dispense with evidence is that it would breach rights under the Constitution. So be it. But in that case the USA should not expect other countries to extradite without evidence. If the present order had been in force at the time, we would have had to extradite the Algerian pilot, Lofti Raisi, against whom the American authorities failed to produce any meaningful evidence whatsoever of involvement in the terrible events of 9/11.
        Many other countries have extradition treaties with the USA, but I understand that only two extradition treaties, those of Ireland and France, permit extradition on the basis of prima facie evidence. However, Article III of the Irish treaty provides that extradition may be refused when the alleged offence is regarded under the law of the requested state as having been committed in its territory. Article V of the Irish treaty provides that extradition may be refused when the authorities in the requested state have decided to refrain from prosecuting the person whose surrender is sought or have discontinued criminal proceedings. The French treaty provides no obligation on a party to extradite its own nationals.
        Therefore, neither of these treaties is at all comparable with the treaty of 31 March 2003. I have to say that the inference here is that in negotiating the treaty, our negotiators failed lamentably to consider several serious issues, and failed to insert the kind of safeguards which are contained in the Irish treaty.
        I therefore ask the Government to make a new Order in Council revoking the designation of the USA under Section 71(4). There should be no question of designating the USA again at least until it has ratified the treaty, but I believe that we should go beyond this. For the reasons I have given, we should never have agreed to this treaty in this form. We have power, under Article 24 of the Extradition Treaty, to terminate it. We should, and I believe we must, exercise that power. We could then negotiate a new treaty that would simplify the procedures but would still require evidence for extradition in either direction. Further, the Government should also amend Part 2 of the Extradition Act to permit the refusal of extradition where the alleged offence was committed wholly or mainly in the United Kingdom and the United Kingdom is therefore the proper forum for the criminal trial.
        The Government have failed to give proper protection to people within their jurisdiction by entering into this treaty and by designating the USA, and the Government should put this right as soon as possible.
        6.8 p.m.
        Lord Lester of Herne Hill: My Lords, we should all be very grateful to my noble friend Lord Goodhart for tabling this Question. He has raised issues which ought

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        to be of concern to all those who care for the liberties and rights of the peoples of this country and beyond, and for the international rule of law. I shall attempt to avoid repeating what has been said so eloquently and powerfully by my noble friend, but I should like to make a few additional points.
        Like my noble friend, I had the great benefit of an education many years ago at Harvard Law School. Unlike him, I do not come from a distinguished United States/British family. My noble friend's father, the late Sir Arthur Lehman Goodhart, was a very great jurist who flattered this country by living here. No one could accuse either my noble friend or myself of being anything other than a good friend of the United States. Indeed, in my case I would say that almost everything I learnt about the law was learnt at Harvard Law School. Sadly, however, the principles I learnt there have rather died out over quite a significant part of the United States in recent times.
        Some years ago I introduced a Private Member's Bill to encourage the parliamentary scrutiny of important treaties. In the debate on the Bill I can recall referring to the Ponsonby rule and to the fact that when Arthur Ponsonby was a Minister working with Ramsay MacDonald, he managed to blurt out during a debate on, I think, the Treaty of Locarno, a new way of enhancing some kind of knowledge and scrutiny in Parliament of treaties—what we call the Ponsonby rule. I pointed out then that the Ponsonby rule does not provide any effective means of parliamentary scrutiny; and that what we really needed—and need—is a committee, either of this House or of both Houses, that can look properly at at least some treaties, in the way that we look very properly at European legislation in our treaty scrutiny in both Houses.
        The committee of the noble Lord, Lord Wakeham, on the reform of the House was kind enough to recommend that some such committee should be established. It has never happened. If ever we want a case to illustrate, as my noble friend has said, why the use of the Crown prerogative to make, and become bound by, treaties needs to be under the scrutiny of Parliament before the damage is done, this treaty shows why that is so. We have a fine system of scrutiny of European legislation. I do not regard it as acceptable any longer that we have no effective scrutiny of matters of this kind, especially when they affect the rights and liberties of the subject. I should be very surprised if the official Opposition did not agree with what I have said. This is really a matter that transcends party politics.
        As my noble friend explained, the treaty was signed at the end of March 2003, but no text was available to the public until the end of May 2003. The text was not available for comment before signature. I should like to ask the Minister what conceivable justification there is for the complete lack of transparency before the treaty was signed.
        It would be an exaggeration if I were to describe the treaty as an unequal treaty in the sense of the series of treaties that were signed by the Qing dynasty with imperial powers in Victorian times. Those treaties were
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        forced upon China because of the domination of imperial powers seeking to do what they liked in pursuit of profit. But all the same, this is an unequal treaty. It is part of an imperial trend in United States foreign and legal policy in seeking to extend United States jurisdiction beyond its territory without being prepared for reciprocity with other friendly states, still less accepting the jurisdiction of any supranational judicial authority. It is unequal in the sense that it denies equal protection to citizens and others within the jurisdiction of the two countries.
        As my noble friend explained, the United States is not required to show a prima facie case for its extradition requests to the United Kingdom, even though probable cause must be shown for extradition from the United States. There is therefore no reciprocity and no equal protection. Yet, reciprocity has always been at the heart of extradition law, whether national law or international law. So this treaty flouts that long-standing tradition which goes back well beyond the century.
        The United Kingdom Government have argued—as will probably be argued in reply today—that whereas the United States has constitutional guarantees preventing it from extraditing an American citizen on the say-so of a foreign government, we have only an unwritten constitution which does not contain a similar guarantee protecting British citizens, and so our birthright as people of this country is unprotected in the way that the American birthright is protected. I do not think much of that as an argument in itself. But it surely is an argument, if at all, in favour of not entering into the treaty on unequal terms—or of now denouncing the treaty—and for developing our own modern British constitution with our own modern British bill of rights.
        The reason why the Irish and French treaties give more protection is that the Irish and the French have constitutional systems which have to be taken into account in negotiations with the United States. All that we have, apart from the European Convention on Human Rights, is parliamentary sovereignty—and parliamentary sovereignty in this area is a busted flush, not only because treaty making operates entirely under the prerogative of the Crown, so that Parliament has nothing to do with it, but also because parliamentary sovereignty does not provide a barrier of any kind to the making of the treaty.
        I am optimistic enough to believe that a future Conservative Party will eventually see the wisdom of favouring a proper modern British written constitution, with proper modern safeguards for our rights and freedoms, in order that we are in as strong a position in negotiating with the European Union, the United States or anyone else as are most other Commonwealth countries and the rest of Europe. But that is for another day.
        Perhaps I may give one or two examples of why the United States should not be considered as equal to Council of Europe countries in terms of international co-operation despite the concerns about the human rights records of some Council of Europe states. I leave aside the death penalty because that is catered for in the treaty.

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        It is fair to say that the United States is not accountable to any international court and has shown a complete disregard in recent times for the judgments of even the International Court of Justice, as anyone who has read the death penalty cases involving Mexico, Germany or Paraguay will know. In the German case, where the Hague court gave an interim ruling, the United States Solicitor General took the position that an order of the International Court of Justice indicating provisional measures is not binding and does not furnish a basis for judicial relief. Any breach of international obligations or human rights which might occur following extradition to the United States effectively would not be judicially reviewable. Such a breach which might occur in relation to a Council of Europe country would give rise to proceedings under the European Convention on Human Rights, but there is no equivalent in the United States.
        When the explanatory memorandum to the treaty was published, we were told that there were two understandings, one of which was that the provisions on onward extradition or surrender of a person extradited to the United Kingdom under the treaty operate to preclude onward surrender to the International Criminal Court. In other words, if someone was brought to the United Kingdom and the matter was considered so serious that it needed to be dealt with by the International Criminal Court, the understanding, and the basis on which the treaty was signed by the United Kingdom, was that that could not be done, thus fettering our own sovereign right to accept the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court, which the United States refuses to do.
        In addition to the concerns expressed by my noble friend about the diversity among the states of the union, Professor Herman Schwartz, a distinguished professor of law at the American University in Washington, published an important article in Newsday magazine on 18 August this year. In it, he referred to the general attitude of the United States towards torture in recent times. He also referred to a disclosed government memorandum on the interrogation of detainees, which has been widely condemned for twisting the law to justify cruel, inhuman and degrading interrogation tactics. He referred to the most notorious of the memoranda as having been issued by the Assistant Attorney General in the Justice Department, and he indicated that the official who wrote that memorandum—which I shall not now quote, but which was to dilute the international standards on torture and inhuman and degrading treatment—was one Jay S Bybie, who was appointed by President Bush to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals a year after he wrote the memorandum.
        Professor Schwartz also points out that another man who approved another notorious memorandum of this kind, this time a Defence Department general counsel, was one William Haynes, who has been nominated to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals. That nomination is pending. He gave other examples that I shall not take time to mention.
        718
        These examples show not only that state jurisdictions vary, and that some of them are distinctly dodgy when it comes to extradition, but also that in the federal system, political interference and matters involving a very right-wing and unbalanced series of appointments are seriously undermining the rule of law on the federal bench, as well as in state courts.
        I repeat what I said at the beginning. I am a friend of the United States, but I fear for the rights and liberties of our people, if they are to be sent to the United States under this unequal treaty. I very much hope to hear something positive from the Minister in reply.
        Lord Slynn of Hadley: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down, will he confirm that despite his optimism that the Opposition will one day welcome a written constitution for this country, and despite his undoubted enthusiasm for such a day, happy or otherwise, what he is really saying is that we do not need to wait for that written constitution before this country can insist on providing proper safeguards for people in this country—the reciprocity to which the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, referred—and that the options are already there to make sure that these treaties do what they ought to do?
        Lord Lester of Herne Hill: My Lords, I thank the noble and learned Lord, Lord Slynn. I did not mean to suggest for a moment that we would have to wait 20 or 30 years to put our system right before this injustice could be dealt with.
        Viscount Waverley: My Lords, is the principle of reciprocity enshrined in the draft European constitution that will be before us shortly?
        6.23 p.m.
        Baroness Anelay of St Johns: My Lords, we have had an interesting divergence from the normal rules of Unstarred Questions but we have all been tolerant about that, given the well-informed sources of both questions. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, for giving us the opportunity to return to this vexed matter. I shall not seek to set out the detail of the historical or legal perspective, because both have been admirably presented with clarity by the noble Lords, Lord Goodhart and Lord Lester of Herne Hill. I will confine myself to an outline of our position on these Benches and to putting one or two questions to the Minister. In doing so, I shall follow the example given by both noble Lords who have already spoken and will not comment on the position of individual cases that are currently the subject of legal proceedings. It would not be appropriate to do so.
        We first debated this matter in the context of the Extradition Act, when the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, moved an amendment on 27 October 2003, which would have prevented any state being designated as a category 2 territory unless the legal conditions on which persons might be extradited from that territory to the UK were substantially similar to the legal conditions on which persons might be extradited from the UK to that territory. That set out the principle that we are debating

        719
        today: the Government's failure to obtain reciprocity of benefit between the US and the UK. I supported the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, then and I continue to support his argument now.
        It is extraordinary that the Government were prepared to sign away our protections with regard to the need for the US to produce prima facie evidence. It is even more extraordinary because the Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Scotland, admitted in Committee on the Bill that when they agreed the treaty, the Government knew full well that the US could not reciprocate because its constitutional arrangements are such that it is not allowed to relax the requirement for prima facie evidence to be presented.
        Although I have been challenged, enticed and invited to respond to the issue of a written constitution, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Lester of Herne Hill, that that is a very big debate and I am relieved to save it for another day.
        In the past, the noble Baroness, Lady Scotland, sought to mitigate the wealth of evidence against the Government's position by stating two points: first, that we got a good deal from the Government's negotiations because the US may now return people to this country more expeditiously: and secondly, that we had already surrendered the right to require prima facie evidence in our agreements with other democracies, the point to which the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, referred.
        The questions that flow from the position adopted by the Government in our previous debates are as follows: first, can the Minister say what other steps the Government took to obtain the proper return of accused persons to the United Kingdom from the US under the existing extradition agreements before deciding to surrender our right to require the presentation of prima facie evidence before our citizens may be despatched to the US, and when they took those steps? Secondly, why was it considered to be a proportionate response for the Government to surrender such an important safeguard as the requirement for prima facie evidence? Thirdly, in respect of our surrender of the requirement for prima facie evidence in our agreements with other countries, will the Minister list those countries which have this benefit but which do not fall into the categories of former Commonwealth countries or countries that are governed by the broad principles of EU conventions and those of the Council of Europe?
        I believe that the Government should today give a positive response to the question posed by the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, in the title of his Unstarred Question. They should give an assurance to the House that they will reconsider the current legal provisions governing extradition to the United States. I also believe that, at the very least, the Government should now defer the approval of the extradition to the United States of any British subjects until the United States Senate ratifies the Extradition Treaty of March 2003.
        The noble Lord, Lord Lester of Herne Hill, was absolutely correct to point out that, in our debates on this matter, all of us have been in the position of being friends of the United States. We have not been
        720
        criticising that country. It remains one of our closest and most enduring allies. But we have a duty to protect our own citizens and to ensure that any system of extradition is as fair and as reciprocal as possible. So far, the Government have failed in that regard.
        6.28 p.m.
        Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, for bringing forward this Unstarred Question because it enables us to set out our position. However, having said those encouraging words, I have little doubt that what the noble Lord will hear from the Government Benches this evening will not necessarily meet with his approval.
        The Government are not in a position to reconsider the legal provisions currently governing extradition to the United States and do not wish to do so. The issues raised today regarding the US/UK extradition treaty, as all noble Lords who spoke in the debate know well and have affirmed, have already been debated and deliberated at great length during the passage through Parliament of the Extradition Act and when the United States was designated as a Part 2 territory, pursuant to the Extradition Act 2003, at the end of last year. All the required parliamentary procedures were duly followed and approval was secured. I cannot see that there have been any significant changes that warrant the reconsideration of our extradition arrangements with the United States.
        Lord Goodhart: My Lords, does the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, accept that there has been one very important failure—that is, the failure of the US Senate to ratify the treaty, which we were told would happen early in 2004? There is now no sign of its proceeding to do so.
        Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, I acknowledge that the treaty has not been considered by the Senate, but it is our understanding that that will now proceed and take place in the near future, whatever that means.
        The new treaty provides a much more modern framework for the making and receiving of requests for extradition. It introduces a sentence threshold of 12 months in both the requesting and requested states in order for offences to be considered extraditable. Many more offences that were not encompassed by the old treaty, such as computer-related crime, will now be classed as extraditable offences.
        The United Kingdom has implemented the new treaty through the general reform of our extradition law. In this respect, we have simply placed the United States on a similar footing as many other countries, notably Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and those countries which fall under the European Convention on Extradition. The treaty under which requests between the United States and the United Kingdom are made is still the 1972 treaty until the United States ratifies the new treaty agreed in 2003. As I said earlier, the US authorities have assured us that the new treaty will be considered by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee as soon as practicable and possible.

        721
        In the mean time, all requests for extradition made to the United Kingdom are considered under the provisions of the Extradition Act 2003, which provides full and effective safeguards for the rights of requested persons. It is worth reminding your Lordships what those safeguards are.
        First, the district judge must consider whether extradition would be barred by reason that the person is really wanted on the grounds of race, religion, nationality or political opinion. Secondly, the judge must also decide whether extradition would be incompatible with the person's human rights under the European Convention on Human Rights. Thirdly, the Home Secretary must refuse extradition if there is a risk that the death penalty may be carried out unless he receives a guarantee that it will not be carried out. Fourthly, the Home Secretary must also be satisfied that there are speciality arrangements so that the person can be tried only for offences for which the requested person was found to be extraditable by the United Kingdom. There are also avenues of appeal against the decisions of the district judge and the Home Secretary.
        Reciprocity has been mentioned during this short debate, and I shall come to it in turn. However, I do not agree that the Extradition Act 2003 (Designation of Part 2 Territories) Order 2003 should be amended to require the United States to provide prima facie evidence with its requests to the United Kingdom. The United States does not place this requirement on requests made by the United Kingdom. The United Kingdom does not make this a requirement of any extradition request from states party to the European Convention on Extradition, including countries as far afield as Russia and South Africa, nor from Australia, New Zealand or Canada.
        The requirement for the United Kingdom to establish "probable cause" in any extradition request to the United States is less stringent than providing a prima facie case, but it is broadly comparable to the requirement to provide information about the offence, which is what the United Kingdom requires of the United States of America.
        The position was not reciprocal before we made the recent changes. The United Kingdom has never demanded reciprocity from extradition partners; for example, by extraditing our own nationals to countries which cannot reciprocate. We are satisfied that the Extradition Act 2003 provides full and effective safeguards which allow requested persons to argue for their rights before the courts.
        A great deal has been said about where persons should be prosecuted for offences following the United States' extradition request for the "Enron Three". The key issue is to ensure that offences are dealt with in the place where they can be most effectively prosecuted. For example, where the main witnesses and the main evidence are in another state, then it makes sense for the defendants to be extradited to face justice there. Assuming that the state has a justice system that is comparable to our own in terms of fairness, it is hard to disagree with that.
        722
        As for the case of the Enron Three, it would be wrong for me to go into any great detail about it. I am grateful that noble Lords have not attempted to draw us out on that case. But it is perhaps worth saying t hat on 15 October, at Bow Street magistrates' court, the district judge found that there was a good and proper case for prosecuting the three in the United States, and sent the case to the Home Secretary for his decision.
        Lord Goodhart: My Lords, is it not correct that the district judge made no such finding, as a finding? He expressed the view that there was such evidence but he had not actually considered whether this was the case or not because it was not necessary for him to do so. He made no legal finding on the point.
        Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, my understanding is that the district court judge found that there was a good and proper case for prosecuting the three in the United States. That is a slightly different point. On that basis, quite rightly, he sent the case to the Home Secretary for a decision on whether to order extradition. As the noble Lord knows, the Home Secretary will have to make that decision in due course, and quite shortly. More than that I think it would be wrong for me to say.
        The noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, and others asked some questions with which I shall attempt to deal, as best I can, from the Dispatch Box. The noble Lords, Lord Goodhart and Lord Lester, spoke about treaties and scrutiny. It is normal for treaties which require to be negotiated confidentially between countries not to be given effect until after signature. The Extradition Act 2003 and the Part 2 order gave the opportunity, we believe, for the appropriate level of parliamentary scrutiny. It is worth noting that no amendments were proposed during that process.
        The noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, stated that the European Convention on Extradition
        Lord Lester of Herne Hill: My Lords, is the noble Lord saying that the Government are opposed to the recommendation of the Wakeham committee that there should be a proper treaty scrutiny committee to deal with the making of treaties in terms of parliamentary accountability?
        While I am on my feet, I should like to ask a second question. I think that the Minister said, but I could not believe it, that he saw no difference in the treaty between the American standard in Article 8(3)(c)—probable cause—and the standard in Article 8(2)(a) which is a mere description of the nature of the offence. Is he seriously saying on behalf of the Government that the two standards are the same and that merely describing the offence is the same as probable cause? If so, will he explain how that can be?
        Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, a lawyer I am not. My understanding is that they are broadly similar, and that that has provided a satisfactory basis for

        723
        comparison. As to the noble Lord's first point, perhaps the noble Lord would just remind me of it again.
        Lord Lester of Herne Hill: My Lords, I thought that it was common ground all round that the Wakeham committee's suggestion of a treaty scrutiny committee was one that the Government were sympathetic to but had left it to the House to decide upon. I thought that that was the position.
        Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, I am not clear whether that is the position. What I did say earlier was simply this—that we felt that it was right that the treaty should be negotiated in a confidential way and should not come into effect until after signature. At that stage, as part of the process of the order-making, there was the appropriate opportunity—because I am sure the noble Lord appreciates the need for confidentiality—for some discussion of the treaty. We had those debates. I have a copy of the relevant Hansard here, and many of the issues raised in your Lordships' House this evening were raised on that occasion.
        Lord Morgan: My Lords, my noble friend says frequently that it is a tradition of this country that we should have confidentiality and secrecy in discussing these matters. We have also heard that we are awaiting a full public discussion in the United States. Why should this country be so extraordinarily supine in having a public discussion about an international treaty? Is that not a major feature of the defects of our constitution?
        Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, the noble Lord makes an interesting constitutional point, but we go through our processes and cannot dictate or determine how other jurisdictions work through their processes or the way in which they consider matters of this nature. However, the noble Lord makes an interesting point in contribution to the debate.
        I wanted to deal with some of the issues that were raised earlier. The noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, made the point that the European Convention on extradition is fully reciprocal. We do not take that as being exactly the case. States that are party to the convention can make reservations to it so that they can bring it into force under their domestic law, when their domestic law would otherwise be in conflict with the convention. That is really what I meant when I said that extradition could not always be exactly reciprocal.
        The noble Lord, Lord Lester, suggested that we ought to have a written constitution. Obviously, that is a much broader question than the one that we are dealing with this evening. I believe that the noble Lord was suggesting that we should make it comparable perhaps with the Irish approach, so that we have equality of arms in negotiations with other states, and to protect the rights of British citizens. The point here, which is one that I made earlier, is that the new Extradition Act 2003 contains full and sufficient safeguards, including explicit reference to the European Convention on Human Rights—
        724
        protection that was of course not there before the current Government came into office. So there is a protection of the rights of requested persons—and, in particular, protection for British citizens.
        The noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, asked a number of questions. The first point that she made related to the steps taken before negotiations began to secure the rights and interests of British citizens. Again, I return to the point about the full and sufficient safeguards in the Act to protect the rights of all persons requested for extradition, including those protections offered by the European Convention on Human Rights. All requests for extradition are dealt with by, and will be subject to, the provisions of the Extradition Act 2003.
        The noble Baroness also asked which countries that are not former Commonwealth or Council of Europe countries do not have to provide prima facie evidence. The answer to that is that there is none. However, Council of Europe countries, of which there about 40 including Albania and South Africa—no, that cannot be right. I shall pursue this question further outside this debate, because the handwriting of the note that I have been given is not perfect and I do not want to give an imprecise response.
        I think that I have covered most of the points raised during this useful debate—
        Lord Baker of Dorking: My Lords, the Minister said at the beginning that his speech would be unwelcome, but it is also inadequate, in that he has not answered several of the points that have been raised. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, for bringing the issue of reciprocity to the attention of the House. The Minister cannot simply get away with the argument saying that we have not had it in the past, so we cannot have it in future, when America is asking us fundamentally to change the whole situation. The Government should have taken a much tougher line. Nor has the Minister answered the question about the British citizens who, as a result of this measure, are in a position whereby their rights are not protected as those of American, French or Irish are protected, by their constitution. He has not answered that point.
        There was a third point that the Minister did not answer. If he is so satisfied with this particular arrangement, why is it that any foreign national who appears before an American court finds it virtually impossible to get bail? That is an erosion of a right. Will it be protected under the European Convention on Human Rights? I think not. That is an example of a measure for which President Bush has asked and which the Government have given in to. That is not the right way to behave when the rights of British citizens are directly involved.
        Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, I do not agree with the noble Lord. I agree that this has been a useful airing of some of these issues, which have been aired before extensively during the passage of the Extradition Bill. I make the point again, on the issue of reciprocity, that previous governments, including the government of which the noble Lord was an experienced and long-standing member, did not believe that exact reciprocity

        725
        was appropriate. I would argue that exact reciprocity would not in all circumstances have been possible and would not necessarily, in any event, have made the extradition process work as well as it has in our experience.
        As to the noble Lord's final point about protecting the rights of British citizens, the Human Rights Act, the European convention and the other legislation provide rights and protections that were not there before, and that strengthens the rights of British citizens.
        Lord Lester of Herne Hill: My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister, but will he accept that the European Convention on Human Rights certainly protects the right to liberty, including bail, for people in this country who are being detained in this country and tried here, but that it does not protect against extraditing someone from this country to the United States, where they will be deprived of bail. The European convention is of no value to a British citizen sent to the United States and completely denied bail in some undesirable state jurisdiction. I hope that the
        726
        Minister understands that I am seeking to explain that the European convention is of no real value in that context. It is of value in the context of the death penalty or of human and degrading treatment, but not of a complete denial of bail.
        Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, I would not want to get into an argument about the broader effect of the European convention. However, I believe that our legislation, and the Human Rights Act in particular, provides us with very important protections, and I am sure that the noble Lord will acknowledge that in this case.
        Lord Baker of Dorking: My Lords, it does riot provide protection on bail. The Minister should answer the noble Lord's point.
        Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, I am not going to be drawn into answering the noble Lord's point. I shall think about it some more and provide him with a response.
        House adjourned at twelve minutes before seven o'clock.

  Northern Ireland: Offences Involving Private Hire Taxi Drivers
  Northern Ireland: Offences Involving Private Hire Taxi Drivers
  Northern Ireland National Memorial Committee
  Northern Ireland National Memorial Committee
  West Belfast: Gaeltacht Quarter
  West Belfast: Gaeltacht Quarter
  Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
  Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
  Prisoners: Repatriation of Foreign Nationals
  Prisoners: Repatriation of Foreign Nationals
  Gypsies and Travellers: Housing Needs
  Gypsies and Travellers: Housing Needs
  Millennium Dome
  Millennium Dome
  Freedom of Information Act 2000
  Freedom of Information Act 2000
  Northern Ireland: Inland Revenue and Customs and Excise
  Northern Ireland: Inland Revenue and Customs and Excise
  Licensing Act 2003: Impact on Law and Order
  Licensing Act 2003: Impact on Law and Order
  Pensions
  Pensions
  European Monetary System and EU Single Currency
  European Monetary System and EU Single Currency
  Olympic Games 2012: London Bid
  Olympic Games 2012: London Bid
  Information Technology Projects: Oversight
  Information Technology Projects: Oversight
  NHS Continuing Care
  NHS Continuing Care
  Carers
  Carers
  Multiple Sclerosis: Aimspro
  Multiple Sclerosis: Aimspro
  Modernising Rural Delivery Programme
  Modernising Rural Delivery Programme
  Biodiversity
  Biodiversity

  Home Office: Autumn Performance Report 2003
  The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Scotland of Asthal)
  The Home Office Autumn Performance Report 2003 has been published today by command of Her Majesty. Copies of the report are available in the Library. The report is also available on the Home Office website.

  The report sets out the progress we have made towards achieving our public service agreement targets.

  The report shows we have made significant progress. Crime has fallen dramatically and people's fear is following suit. Police performance is improving and the justice gap is continuing to narrow. Our correctional services are operating effectively, we have expanded drug treatment and asylum is increasingly under control. Our work to increase race equality and community engagement is beginning to show real results: there are now 1.6 million more volunteers than in 2001, and more black and minority ethnic police officers than ever before.

  Independent Race Monitor Annual Report
  Baroness Scotland of Asthal
  My right honourable friend the Home Secretary has today placed in the Library of each House his response to the second annual report produced under Section 19E of the Race Relations Act 1976 by Mary Coussey, the independent race monitor, which was placed in the Library of both Houses in July. The race monitor has a statutory duty to report to Parliament via the Home Secretary on ministerial authorisations made under Section 19D of the Race Relations Act enabling immigration staff to discriminate on the basis of nationality or ethnic or national origin in the exercise of their functions.

  Juvenile and Adult Offender Reconviction Rates
  Baroness Scotland of Asthal
  The Home Office has today published two online national statistics reports on reconviction rates, which are the basis for measuring progress against its 2002 public service agreement target, to reduce reoffending for young offenders and for adult offenders by 5 per cent by 2005–06.
  WS 46
  The results are:

  for juveniles, a reduction in reconvictions of 4.5 per cent for those dealt with in 2001 and 3.6 per cent for 2002, both as compared to 2000;

  for adults, a 1.8 per cent reduction for those starting a community sentence or discharged from custody in 2001, compared to 2000.

  Both of these are encouraging and demonstrate that we are on course to meet our PSA target.

  The juvenile report includes a correction of figures published in 2003 in Home Office Online Report 18/03. That report indicated that 2001 figures showed a 22.5 per cent reduction in reconvictions compared to 1997. As a result of an internal review of the methodology for calculating these figures, errors were identified and we commissioned an independent peer review, which confirmed the methodology used. The corrected figure for the fall in reconvictions between 1997 and 2001 is 7 per cent. Although lower than the previously published figure, this is nevertheless very significant progress.

  War Pensions Rates 2005
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Defence (Lord Bach)
  My honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Mr Ivor Caplin) has made the following Written Ministerial Statement.

  The new rates of war pensions and allowances proposed from April 2005 are set out in the tables below. The annual uprating of war pensions and allowances for 2005 will take place from the week beginning 11 April.

  War Pensions Rates

  (Weekly rates unless otherwise shown)

  Rates 2004

  Rates 2005

  WAR PENSIONS

  Disablement Pension (100% rates)

  officer (£ per annum)

  6648.00

  6851.00

  other ranks

  127.40

  131.30

  Age allowances

  40%–50%

  8.55

  8.80

  Over 50% but not over 70%

  13.10

  13.50

  Over 70% but not over 90%

  18.65

  19.25

  Over 90%

  26.20

  27.00

  Disablement gratuity

  specified minor injury (min.)

  810.00

  835.00

  specified minor injury (max.)

  6055.00

  6243.00

  unspecified minor injury (min.)

  335.00

  345.00

  unspecified minor injury (max.)

  7874.00

  8118.00

  Unemployability allowance

  personal

  78.70

  81.15

  adult dependency increase

  44.35

  45.70

  increase for first child

  10.30

  10.60

  increase for subsequent children

  12.10

  12.50

  Invalidity allowance

  higher rate

  15.55

  16.05

  middle rate

  10.00

  10.30

  lower rate

  5.00

  5.15

  Constant attendance allowance

  exceptional rate

  96.20

  99.20

  intermediate rate

  72.15

  74.40

  full day rate

  48.10

  49.60

  part-day rate

  24.05

  24.80

  WS 47

  War Pensions Rates

  (Weekly rates unless otherwise shown)

  Rates 2004

  Rates 2005

  Comforts allowance

  higher rate

  20.60

  21.20

  lower rate

  10.30

  10.60

  Mobility supplement

  45.85

  47.25

  Allowance for lowered standard of occupation (maximum)

  48.04

  49.52

  Therapeutic earnings limit

  3744.00

  4056.00

  Exceptionally severe disablement allowance

  48.10

  49.60

  Severe disablement occupational allowance

  24.05

  24.80

  Clothing allowance (£ per annum)

  164.00

  169.00

  Education allowance (£ per annum) (max)

  120.00

  120.00

  War widow(er)s' pension (further details in schedule WWP)

  99.50

  Widow(er)s'-private

  96.50

  Widow(er)s' (other ranks)

  96.50

  99.50

  Widow(er)-Officer (£ p.a. max)

  5948.00

  6132.00

  Childless widow(er)s' u-40 (other ranks)

  23.13

  23.85

  " " (Officer max.£s pa)

  5948.00

  6132.00

  Supplementary Pension

  62.68

  64.62

  Age allowance

  (a) age 65 to 69

  11.05

  11.40

  (b) age 70 to 79

  21.15

  21.80

  (c) age 80 and over

  31.40

  32.35

  Children's allowance

  Increase for first child

  15.20

  15.65

  Increase for subsequent children

  16.95

  17.50

  Orphan's pension

  Increase for first child

  17.25

  17.80

  Increase for subsequent children

  18.95

  19.55

  Unmarried dependant living as spouse (max)

  94.15

  97.15

  Rent allowance (maximum)

  36.40

  37.55

  Adult orphan's pension (maximum)

  74.15

  76.45

  Fire and Rescue National Framework 2005–06
  The Minister of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (Lord Rooker)
  My right honourable friend the Minister for Local and Regional Government, Mr Nick Raynsford, has made the following Written Ministerial Statement.

  Today the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister is publishing the 2005–06 Fire and Rescue National Framework.

  The Government remain committed to reduce the number of fire deaths and deliberate fires. The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister's fire public service agreement target commits us to achieving long-term reductions in fire deaths and arson, including in the worst off areas. The Government also recognise the importance of working closely with fire and rescue authorities and their staff in order to achieve these goals.

  The Fire and Rescue National Framework sets out the strategy for meeting the Government's objectives and delivering an improved service that achieves better value for money for the communities it serves.
  WS 48
  At the request of fire and rescue authorities we agreed to publish the 2005–06 national framework in time to inform authorities' budget setting processes. The 2005–06 national framework reflects progress that has been, made since the publication of the 2004–05 national framework in July 2004 and reflects comments we have received in response to our consultation exercise. We have carefully considered all responses and have reflected them in the national framework where appropriate. The Government's full response to the comments is published on the ODPM website.

  The national framework is a forward looking document. Fire and rescue authorities will soon begin the process of comprehensive performance assessment. Fire CPA will provide a robust assessment of progress by the service since publication of the White Paper and a firm basis for further improvement.

  The 2005–06 national framework has effect under Section 21(6) of the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004 as a revision, which appears to the Secretary of State to be significant, of the 2004–05 national framework.

  Copies of the 2005–06 national framework will be made available in the Libraries of both Houses.

  Bosnia and Herzegovina: Export Licence Application
  The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean)
  In September 2004 the Government issued a licence for the export of ballistic body armour vests to the Ministry of Security in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Ministry of Security requires the vests for the State Information and Protection Agency (SIPA). SIPA is responsible for, inter alia, diplomatic protection, which includes the British Embassy in Sarajevo as well as the missions of EU partners and other allies; tackling organised crime; and investigating war crimes.

  An EU arms embargo has been in place against Bosnia and Herzegovina since 1996. The purpose of the embargo was to aid the establishment of peace and stability for the people of the region, taking into account in particular the need to ensure the safety of international troops and civilian personnel deployed. The embargo was amended in 1999 to exclude demining equipment and the transfer of small arms to the police.

  We fully support the EU embargo. However, we are, in limited circumstances, prepared to make exemptions where denying an export would frustrate the purposes of the embargo. The UK has been active in encouraging Bosnia and Herzegovina to take greater responsibility for maintaining the rule of law and strengthening civilian policing. I am confident that granting this exception is fully consistent with this responsible approach of supporting the development of civilian policing while respecting the aims of the embargo.

  Delivering Justice, Rights and Democracy: DCA Strategy 2004–09
  The Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs and Lord Chancellor (Lord Falconer of Thoroton)
  I am today publishing DCA'S strategy for the next five years. This explains how we intend to reform and modernise the justice system and constitution so that they are transparent, accountable and responsive to the needs of the public. An overview of the strategy and the detailed strategy itself are both available on the DCA website (www.dca.gov.uk), and I shall also be placing copies in the Libraries of both Houses.

  Selective Serotonin Re-uptake Inhibitors
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Lord Warner)
  Following interest in both Houses about the issues surrounding the safety of selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors (SSRIs), this Statement informs the House of the completion of the United Kingdom review of SSRIs and the publication today of the report. The Committee on Safety of Medicines (CSM) expert working group has now delivered comprehensive advice on the use of these drugs in children, young people and adults following a thorough review of all the evidence available. This gives parents, patients and those who treat depressive illnesses the information they need to make informed decisions about treatment of these potentially devastating conditions.

  In 2003 an expert working group of the CSM was set up to consider further the safety of SSRIs, with particular reference to suicidal behaviour and withdrawal reactions. The expert group has examined all the evidence available from a wide range of sources, including a specific objective to listen to the patient viewpoint. The expert group has already reached conclusions on the use of SSRIs in children and the Government have published its findings. This latest report focuses on the use of SSRIs in adults. The work of this group is now complete and a comprehensive account of this work is being published today. In short, it concludes that:

  there should be strengthened warnings on coming off SSRIs at the end of a course of treatment and how to minimise the risk of experiencing a withdrawal reaction;

  there should be specific advice on using the recommended dose of the SSRI because for the
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  majority of SSRIs in depression, clinical trial data do not show an additional benefit above the lowest recommended dose;

  there should be clearer advice on what is known about the risk of suicide and suicidal behaviour—while clinical trial data cannot rule out a modest increase in the risk compared to placebo, there is now good evidence from large population studies that there is no clear increase in the risk of suicide in relation to SSRIs compared to other antidepressants;

  there is no clear evidence of an increased risk of self-harm and suicidal thoughts in young adults of 18 years or over. But individuals mature at different rates and young adults are at a higher background risk of suicidal behaviour than older adults, so as a precautionary measure young adults treated with SSRIs should be closely monitored. The expert group also recommended that in further research on the safety and efficacy of SSRIs young adults should be assessed separately.

  The CSM has also recommended that treatment with venlafaxine (Efexor) should only be initiated by specialists and that there should be in place arrangements for ongoing supervision of the patient.

  The report includes the key evidence on which the advice of the expert working group is based, including summaries of clinical trials submitted by companies at the MHRA's request. This unusual step demonstrates the MHRA's commitment to being as open as possible in drug regulation.

  The report of the expert group is being published alongside guidelines from the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) on depression and anxiety. In this way, the new advice of CSM can feed directly into clinical practice. Copies of the expert group's report and the NICE guidelines have been placed in the Library.

  Communications to patients and prescribers are taking place today and copies of these materials have also been placed in the Library. SSRIs are an important group of medicines, which help patients who suffer depressive illness. The health benefits of SSRIs in adults are still considered to outweigh the risk of adverse drug reactions. Patients currently taking venlafaxine should not stop taking their medicine but should consult their doctor for advice on treatment as should patients taking other SSRIs who are experiencing any side effects or are concerned about their treatment.